


you belong to the temporary

by tagteamme



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Action/Adventure, Corporate Espionage, Inception AU, Light Angst, M/M, Medium Burn, Mentions of Other Voltron Paladins, Minor Character Death, Romance, Science Fiction, Slow Burn, actually no i think the more accurate tag would be, if the science is whack blame christopher nolan i ain't got NO brain cells left, mild sugar daddying, mild violence, very brief mentions of suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-18
Updated: 2019-12-13
Packaged: 2020-06-30 10:57:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 34,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19851712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tagteamme/pseuds/tagteamme
Summary: Presented with a chance to finally go home, Keith takes a job from an enigmatic and powerful man.“Hey,” a voice calls out from behind him and Keith turns around. At the top of the staircase, Shirogane stands with his hands shoved in his pockets. He smiles down at Keith as the windows in the empty ballroom shatter, sending a behemoth amount of water cascading through the room and shrouding him like Neptune.“Still no name,” Shirogane says, just as cascading water swallows them both whole.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've wanted to do an Inception AU forever and here we are  
> Dedicated in part to [hannah](https://archiveofourown.org/users/eternalheatstroke/pseuds/eternalheatstroke) thanks for being there everytime I talked about what the true winning team in this movie was  
> Title is from one of my all time favourite songs from [my main man](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYO77zNhWl4)

When Keith comes to, he’s got a mouthful of wet sand and bruises pulsing across his entire body. Waves lap at him, the foam lingering around him in curiosity as he gasps and sputters and tries to raise himself up on battered hands. He finds himself pushed back down, the pressure in the familiar shape of a heavy work boot. Keith lets himself get flattened out against the ground, lets the toe of the boot flip him over.

A tall figure looks down on him, half obscured by the sun behind him. Keith can’t make out much so he squints in the light to make out the shape of a man who even in deep age, has managed to retain his broadness and his stature. 

Keith has no fight left in him. He brought none to begin with. He groans in pain, his body sore in ways he didn’t know possible. Both his heart and brain feel like they’ve been thoroughly rattled in their cages and Keith thinks that if he makes it out of this intact, he’s going to retire.

The man leans down, expression unreadable. Keith tries to sit up but the boot’s on his chest, keeping him pinned down. For someone who’s an octogenarian, the man possesses great strength. Keith flops back down, feels the water wash around him as the man continues to stare down at him.

It takes a full moment to pass before the man asks, “Have you come to kill me?” 

  
  


* * *

“Whiskey neat,” the bartender slides a glass in front of Keith, and he raises it in a short salute. The drink faintly burns down his throat but Keith can’t feel any of the effects of the alcohol. He’s long forgotten, he thinks.

He scans the crowded party, making sure his men are in place. Large yellow lanterns hang from the ceiling, casting a warm flattering glow on everyone in the ballroom. A quintet plays something sweet and mellow while dark wood arches high above him, matching the smooth countertop of the bar he’s sitting at.

Keith finishes his drink and looks for the mark, eyes flitting across the people milling around. He sees the familiar silver head of a woman scan the room as well, and swears under his breath. If Allura looks lost, that means their mark  _ is _ lost. Keith tries not to draw too much attention to himself as he swivels on his barstool slowly, looking around.

There are only two people responsible for keeping an eye on their mark. If they lose him, Keith can’t carry out the rest of his job. If they lose him, Keith’s in trouble with some very powerful people. He’s good at keeping his calm in these kind of situations though. If they lose their mark, he’ll just get Rolo to flush him out while Keith finishes his extraction.

“A whiskey neat,” there’s the sound of glass on wood again, and Keith turns back to the counter. The bartender looks expectantly at him and Keith squints.

“I didn’t order another one,” Keith says, and the bartender nods. The bartender tips their head to his right and Keith follows the gesture till he sees the mark looking right back at him.

“Compliments of Mr. Shirogane,” the bartender says lightly before they move onto the next customer. Keith swears under his breath, and trepidation quickly flushes his veins as he makes eye contact with the tall, dark-haired man. Even here, he’s put together and handsome in a fitted black jacket that reeks of money. The light of the lanterns illuminate him in an other-worldly way, the scar across the bridge of his nose accenting a chiselled face and white tuft of hair rendering him unmistakable. 

And it looks like he’s noticed Keith. Keith feels nerves chomp at the bit, and the woman who’s two seats away in between them looks up at Keith. The bartender clears their throat as well, and Keith suddenly gets the feeling of being watched. It’s unsettling, but Shirogane is still looking at him with a genial smile like he’s a casual patron at a bar and not a man powerful enough that his main competitor has paid Keith the prettiest penny of them all to commit corporate espionage.

Keith raises the glass with a smile at Shirogane, and the woman goes back to her own drink. Keith hopes that is that, but it’s not. He just hopes that Allura sees what’s happening and acts accordingly.

“I hope the drink was okay,” Shirogane says as he draws close and nods at the glass Keith’s holding. “I told them to give you what you got last time, but to use something more expensive.”

“Can’t taste the difference,” Keith replies easily. It’s not the first time a mark’s noticed him, nor is it the first time one of them has been so direct in finding him. But they’ve not all been the founder and CEO of a multi-billion dollar energy company whose competitors like to use brutal under-the-table tactics to get ahead. If Keith screws up the job, he’s not just off a hefty payroll.

“Takashi Shirogane,” the man sticks hand out. Keith takes the firm handshake, feels a spark, and the counter rattles. The light hanging above the marble ballroom floor flickers before it goes dark. There’s a murmur through the crowd, but everyone carries on as normal.

“You pay this much for a party,” Shirogane looks out at the fused lantern. “You’d think that they’d pay the electricity bill.”

Keith laughs an appropriate amount at that and Shirogane looks back at him with a grin. He looks young like this, boyish in a way Keith hadn’t noticed before and— Keith can’t afford to get distracted. A man, presumably from Shirogane’s security detail approaches them, ignoring Keith completely. He leans in to say something to Shirogane, and Keith catches whispers of an important diplomat wanting to have a private discussion with him.

“I have to go,” Shirogane says, looking back at Keith. “Duty calls. Will I see you around?”

“Of course,” Keith replies easily, and tracks Shirogane with his eyes as he melts into the crowd with his security detail. He waits to see Shirogane get led towards a private room and sees a flash of silver hair before the door gets closed. 

Exhaling deeply, Keith slides off the bar stool and starts making his way towards a staircase on the opposite side of the building.

This part is easy, as long as he doesn’t get caught. Keith weaves through sparsely scattered guests in the hall of the upper floor. He’s quiet and unobtrusive, and none of them notice him. Keith makes his way down the familiar floor, finds the large double doors he’s been looking for. They give way for him easily, opening up to a dark red hallway. Keith curses a little as he sees a giant ornate painting of a line hanging in the centre of the hall, at the crux of the fork. Keith hangs left and sees the dark mahogany door. 

Beyond the door, beyond the large black conference table in the centre and a large wooden cabinet lies a small safe. Keith punches in the code, and waits impatiently for the locks to whirr open. He grabs the manila envelope inside just as someone clears their throat behind him. 

The hair on the back of his neck prickles at the sound. Slowly, Keith folds and tucks the envelope into the inner pocket of his suit and slowly turns around. 

Shirogane stands at the opposite end of the table, still wearing an affable smile. He's got three of his men with him, two of whom are holding onto Allura. Her perfect bun has fallen to pieces around her and she struggles against the men. There's a red blot on her blue dress, sitting right above her thigh, and she grunts in pain as they move her forward. If they shot her there, Keith realizes, it means Shirogane must know. 

“I never got your name,” Shirogane says easily, like they're back at the bar. 

“Yeah, well,” Keith starts, exchanging a quick nervous look with Allura. She presses her lips together and nods, and Keith dives into action. 

He yanks out his silenced pistol from where the holster had been tucked into his waistband. There's a brief flash of surprise on Shirogane’s face before Keith aims the gun at Allura and pulls the trigger, hitting her right in the centre of her forehead. The guards drop her like a sack, and Keith gets them both in their necks too. He slides off the table, and runs. 

Keith doesn't care where he gets to. He shoves past Shirogane and darts down the hall, ducking in through the first door he sees. It leads out to another grand staircase, this time for an empty room. Dust falls from the ceiling as it starts to crack, and the floor rumbles ominously around him. Keith knows he's running out of time, and he barrels down the staircase while yanking out the envelope and ripping it open. 

He screeches to a halt at the foot of the staircase, just as the pillars around him rattle loudly and the wall vibrates. Paintings shake from where they're hung on dark red walls, and one comes loose and falls to the ground. 

The sound of a frame shattering is drowned out by the opening notes of a familiar song. Keith knows he's running out of time, and pulls out the papers from the envelope. 

The song grows louder as he stares at the papers. It's the information he needs, the information he was paid for but almost everything has been redacted. Black stripes censor out paragraphs and paragraphs of sensitive information, and when Keith flips through more papers, some of them are completely black. Keith swears, and the song grows louder. 

“Hey,” a voice calls out from behind him and Keith turns around. At the top of the staircase, Shirogane stands with his hands shoved in his pockets. He smiles down at Keith as the windows in the empty ballroom shatter, sending a behemoth amount of water cascading through the room and shrouding him like Neptune.

“Still no name,” Shirogane says, just as cascading water swallows them both whole. 

  
  


* * *

  
  


Keith surges out of the ice-cold tub with a gasp to see Shirogane holding a gun to Rolo’s head and Allura with her hands up at the doorway. Keith lunges immediately, sliding a choking arm around Shirogane’s neck and yanking the arm with the gun and bringing him to the ground. He struggles but Keith knocks the weapon out of his hand.

Two minutes later finds Keith dropping down onto a stained loveseat while Shiro’s forced into an ugly chair with a quilted satin back. 

“You’re a tricky man,” Shirogane says, looking directly at Keith. Gone is the tailored Versace; he sits in a thick black sweater and jeans now. The apartment around them is old but maintained well, and there’s a rumble outside. Keith can see the angry crowd out of the frosted windows, and knows they don’t have a lot of time. “Only my closest security detail knows about this place. No one but me knows about this place.”

“Hire better security,” Keith grunts. “No one in this world can hide completely.”

“No one but you, right?” Shirogane says lightly, and Keith presses his lips tightly. He props up the gun he relinquished from Shirogane on the handle of the loveseat, and Shirogane raises an eyebrow. 

“You were holding back something,” Keith says evenly. “You knew we were coming and held back a key piece of information.”

“I did,” Shirogane replies with equal calmness. “I knew from the instant I saw you at the bar.”

“Then why let us stay?” Keith asks, and Shirogane gives him the same easy grin that he gave Keith at the bar. It’s colder now, slightly more frigid.

“I wanted to see what you were made of,” Shirogane says. “See if you were good enough.”

“For what?” Keith asks, and Shirogane laughs.

“Does it matter?” he replies, grazing his eyes across the room till it lands on Allura keeping a watch out of the window of the apartment. “You weren’t.”

“We found all your information,” Keith counters, and Shirogane shrugs.

“And it was all censored, correct?” Keith doesn’t like the way Shirogane’s looking at him right now. It burns through him to his core, and makes him shift in his seat. “What good does that do you?”

“Keith,” Allura calls with a concerned voice, eyes glued to the outside. “We don’t have a lot of time left.”

“Fine,” Keith replies, and heaves up from his seat. In a flash of an eye, he’s crossed the carpet and grabbed Shirogane by his shoulders and throws him to the ground. Keith aims the nuzzle of the gun to the back of his head. “Start talking. What were you hiding from us?”

He clicks off the safety, and taps it against the back of Shirogane’s head before he steps back. Keith never raises his voice, but he makes sure to speak with ferocity. “If you want to make it out alive, I’d start talking now.”

Shirogane is silent for a moment. He runs his hand through the shag rug on the floor, carding fingers through the short hairs. And then he starts to laugh.

As the angry crowd bursts into the room, Keith finds out that Shirogane knows his name. That Shirogane knows his reputation. That Shirogane thinks he can control the situation because it’s his dream, up until he finds out it’s Rolo’s. Keith finds out that Shirogane thinks that Keith is a man that can deliver after all.

And all this, because the carpet’s polyester. 

  
  


* * *

  
Takashi Shirogane is, at the end of the day, a man of means and a wide reach. 

Keith's plan is to lay low until Ranveig Energy forgets how much money they've lost on him. Bueno Aires will hide him till he can pick up another job without worrying about one of the world's most powerful energy companies breathing down his neck yet again. He explains as much to Allura as they hustle up the stairs to a helipad for the copter that will take them to the airport where Keith's used the last of his dollars to secure a safe flight. They've had a nervous twenty four hours in Kyoto, not leaving the hotel room until it was time to leave. 

Allura plans to use Argentina as a short pit stop before she flips the switch and heads to India, intending to melt into the cityscape of Mumbai for a few months. It's contradictory like her, and Keith knows her nose follows adventure and not safety. Rolo has long disappeared, having hustled off the Shinkansen a few stops before they did after Allura had chewed him out for fucking up the carpet, of all things. He says he didn’t know the carpet was wool and didn’t know Shirogane would be eating some of it, but no dice. Keith doesn't know what's waiting for Rolo in Nagoya, but he hopes its worth it. They had left Shirogane asleep on the train, and Keith had been more than glad to see the last of him. 

That gladness quickly vanishes when the door to the helicopter slides open, revealing Shirogane in a sharp charcoal gray suit and Rolo sitting across from him, a nervous wreck. 

“He sold you out,” Shirogane says in lieu of a greeting. “it was easy to find him. I didn’t even threaten him and he immediately begged for his life.”

Keith stares at Rolo, who sinks further into his seat. A security guard approaches Keith, gun in hand, and he tenses. The guard turns the butt of the pistol towards him and Shirogane raises an eyebrow. 

“If you want to take care of him,” he says. “the pleasure is yours.”

Keith exchanges a glance with Allura, who's got the steely eyed look that tells him she's calculating their route out. 

“We don't do that,” Keith says, and Shirogane’s lips quirk before he knocks on the window of the other door. It opens, and a giant guard hauls Rolo out. Shirogane gestures towards Keith and Allura. 

“Let's talk business,” he says, and less than five minutes later Keith and Allura find themselves sitting across him in an airborne helicopter. Shirogane assures them that he has no plans for Rolo. He cannot say the same for Ranveig Energy. 

By the time they land in a small private airport, Allura is incensed and Keith's in a state of disbelief. Shirogane looks like he's not just asked an impossible task of them in exchange for Keith being able to return to the States again. Keith knows that his exile from the US isn't exactly a secret, but he's never had someone know that it's been in relation to a job. Shirogane doesn't let on whether or not he knows the exact details. 

Keith's never had anyone who assures him with such confidence that they'd be able to undo it all and make sure he's allowed to return to America, in return for him carrying out a task for him. It seems like an impossible thing to do, but Shirogane points out the task he has laid out for them could be considered impossible too. 

Keith’s been doing this job for a few years now; corporate espionage to stick a knife in the competitor’s side is nothing new to a dream thief. The level which Shirogane wants to take it to is.

“Inception,” Shirogane had said, sharp eyes squared firmly on Keith. His gaze has a patina of warmth layered over immense scrutiny. “There’s an important decision I need my main competitor to make.”

Keith and Allura both startle at the word, Allura moreso. 

“Inception is impossible,” Allura says. “You can’t replicate organic inspiration. It’s impossible to sow an idea and not have someone know where it came from.”

“A tree does not know who plants its seed,” Shirogane raises an eyebrow. “It just grows and grows.”

It is no secret that head of GALRA Engineering is on his deathbed, and has bequeathed the conglomerate to his son, a reserved man who never left his father’s side. Shirogane says the job he wants done is for the greater good; he wants the son to dissolve his father’s empire. Breaking up GALRA Engineering will release their stronghold and allow Shirogane’s own green-energy company to plant its feet as the behemoth of the industry and move it to a more sustainable future.

Allura is strongly against it. She thinks it’s impossible. There is no way to implant an idea in someone’s head, even through a dream, and not have them realize that something is off. She argues about this thoroughly with Shirogane while Keith stares out the window, watching the city grow smaller under their helicopter.

Keith understands Allura’s concern, understands how it seems impossible. Understands why she feels it’s painting a target on their back. But—

“It’s possible,” Keith says quietly, cutting both Allura and Shirogane’s increasingly heated conversation. Allura snaps her head towards him, while Shirogane leans back. “Inception is possible.”

“Will you do it?” Shirogane asks, and Keith frowns in his direction.

“Do I have a choice?” Keith asks, and Shirogane shrugs. 

“If you think you can settle with Ranveig by yourself,” Shirogane says. “And if you think you can return to America by yourself, then yes. You have a choice.”

Keith presses his lips together in a firm line, and the rest of the flight falls into silence. Allura looks like she’s got a lot more to say, while Shirogane does not move his assessing gaze once from the two of them.

Shirogane has offered his private jet to take them anywhere they want; Allura thinks they should walk away. She voices as much as they stand outside the helicopter, in a standoff with Shirogane. It isn't that easy a decision for Keith. Allura doesn’t have any roots anywhere— orphaned as a teenager, Keith shouldn’t either. But there’s a cottage in California where he does, and they run deep. Keith knows that this may be his only chance to return.

“How do I know you can hold up your end of the agreement?” he asks, and a large grin unfurls across Shirogane’s face. 

“You don’t,” Shirogane says with great gusto.”But I can.”

Keith finds himself at a loss for words. He feels Allura grasp onto his elbow, trying to tug him away but he stays. Shirogane instantly picks up on the hesitation and leans forward.

“This deal would be a leap of faith for both of us,” Shirogane says over the whirring chopper blades. “But we are young men, Keith. It’s what we do. Do you want to try, or do you want to die old and alone, thinking of what could have been?”

Shirogane doesn’t know that what could have been is all that Keith dreams of. When he can dream. He looks at Keith with a roguish glimmer in his eye that Keith hasn’t seen in a long time. He doesn’t know how much of it is genuine and how much of it is a show of confidence to rope Keith in. And he doesn’t know if it’s working fully.

Yet, he still finds himself nodding silently, much to Shirogane’s pleasure.

  
  


* * *

  
  


There’s a list of people Keith would really prefer not to buy a drink for. Lance sits neatly in the top ten, yet Keith finds himself passing a few shillings to the bartender in a hazy hole in the wall in Mombasa. Lance flashes them an easygoing grin as Keith scans the room. There are no familiar faces but he still feels tense as he slides into one of the wicker chairs by the window.

“There’s a job coming up,” Keith tells Lance, still keeping an eye on the room at large. “It’s with-”

“Is Allura going to be there?” Lance asks over his glass of palm wine and Keith rolls his eyes. “Hey, I haven’t seen her in awhile. I miss her.”

“She’s there but reluctantly,” Keith replies. He’s got a feeling he can’t place about this job so he figures he has nothing to lose by putting most of the cards on the table from the get go. “It’s not exactly a job she believes can be done, and I won’t blame you if you don’t think so either. But I need you to hear me out first.”

“I’m listening,” Lance swirls his glass, looking around the bar. 

“The heir of Galra Engineering needs to break up his father’s company,” Keith says and Lance raises an eyebrow. “We’ve been hired by their biggest competitor to make sure he does it.”

“Didn’t know you were into grunt work now,” Lance says, and Keith rolls his eyes. “Is this a kidnapping job? You know that I don’t run  _ that _ illegal.”

“We’re still going to do it through dreams. The job needs us to carry out inception,” Keith says, feeling a little impatient. “I know it sounds impossible but-”

“Nah, it’s possible,” Lance cuts in, taking a sip of his wine. “Hard as hell but possible.”

“You’ve done it?” Keith asks and Lance shrugs.

“I’ve tried it,” Lance says. “It didn’t take. The client wasn’t too happy and neither was the mark, hence I’m here.”

Lance waves at the bar in general, and Keith prods him further. “Do you know why it didn’t work?”

“The idea wasn’t simplified enough,” Lance explains. “We were mistaken in what we thought the target’s natural prejudices were. However, with your job, I think the core of your subject’s bias is already evident.”

“Is it?” Keith asks and Lance nods. 

“The relationship with his father,” Lance says. “It’s something I already know a little more than most about. Do you have a chemist?”

“Not yet,” Keith replies, and Lance looks at him thoughtfully.

“I’ve got a friend here,” he says. “Excellent chemist. Great cook too. He makes the strongest sedatives I’ve seen on both sides of the hemisphere.”

“Do I get to meet him?” Keith asks, and Lance raises his glass to his and clinks it.

“Of course,” Lance says, and downs the rest of his wine. He wipes the back of his mouth with little finesse and sets the glass down with a firm  _ thud _ . “After you lose your friend. He’s to your four o’clock.”

Keith figures there’s no point in being subtle about turning and looking. Sure enough, there’s a brand new patron at the bar in a white suit. It’s a bulky man who stands out like a sore thumb amongst the other, more casually-dressed customers. He meets Keith’s gaze and doesn’t break it; Keith takes a thoughtful swig of his drink before setting down his glass.

“Ah,” he says idly. “So Ranveig really isn’t that happy.”

“Don’t think so,” Lance says. “Want me to run interference? Bets off if he starts shooting though.”

“Yep,” Keith says, popping the  _ p _ . He leans over and looks out the open window, down onto the street below. Directly under them, there’s a fruit stall with a wide enough canvas tent. “Meet me back here in thirty?”

“Sounds like a plan,” Lance winks and smacks his lips. Keith gives him a flat look and Lance pushes his chair back. He stands off and brushes off his tan suit, adjusting his bright blue tie before he turns and starts striding towards the man in the white suit.

“Sven!” Keith hears Lance say, right as he climbs onto the stucco ledge. “Long time no see, pal!”

There’s a loud clattering sound and yelling and Keith tips himself over the ledge, bracing himself for impact as he drops down two stories onto the tent of the fruit vendor.

Keith’s not new to getting into violent situations outside of an engineered dream world. His line of work isn’t exactly known for keeping a clean slate with everyone. Still, as he rolls off the canvas and hits the cobblestone below, something in the back of his head wonders what it would be like if he had decided to go into something like aviation instead of cognitive sciences. Keith leaps to his feet and realizes that he isn’t alone— a couple more white suits on the ground start to lunge towards him and he bolts, running down the market street.

The chase is hard, taking him through narrow alleyways and crowded market roads. One suit almost gets him but Keith puts him through the window of a boutique and knocks his friend out cold with a well timed slug to the head. Adrenaline runs through his veins as he tries to slip into a cafe but he’s caught, another white suit barrelling into the building after him. The suit manages to knock him to the ground but Keith’s quick to headbutt him, sending the hardest part of his forehead against the softest part of the suit’s nose.

The suit drops off of him and Keith thinks he can breathe for a second till another one bursts in, this time with a gun drawn. The  _ crack _ of a bullet that Keith barely dodges rings through the cafe, sending everyone into a scrambling frenzy. Keith manages to slip out with the stampede of terrified customers but he doesn’t go hidden for long.

He runs and runs and runs, ducking and weaving as his heart rattles against his ribcage and his lungs burn. He hides behind cars and fruit carts as bullets whiz by him, and finds himself sneaking in between two buildings. The space narrows the further down he goes till he can’t fit anymore, but Keith continues squeezing. He can hear the yelling and clamouring of the suits drawing closer and he shoves, trying to will his body to fit within the concrete gap. 

“I think he’s here!” Keith hears one of the suits yells and the panic ratchets up in him and he tries harder to squeeze through.

He manages to spill out onto the street, gasping for air as he stumbles across sidewalk. There’s a loud honking sound and Keith spins, seeing the door of a black Mercedes Benz swing open and hit the back of another white suit who had his gun drawn. It revs and lurches forward towards Keith, slowing down as it approaches him.

“Care for a lift?” Shirogane leans out, hand still on the door. Keith asks no questions, just rushes into the backseat as fast as he can, faster than Shirogane can move over for him. He slams the door shut and the driver immediately hits the pedal, tearing off on the street. 

“What are you doing in Mombasa?” Keith heaves as they both slide down in their seats, turning invisible to anyone who looks into the car.

“I need to make sure my investment is not bleeding out onto the streets,” Shirogane says, looking over at Keith. “ I can’t afford to lose you. Not with the amount of recommendation you came with.”

Keith opens his mouth, but finds no retort. Shirogane’s saved him from the hands what would otherwise be an inevitably fun night of being tortured at the hands of some grunts. Shirogane watches him for a reply, clearly anticipating some sort of protest. Keith decides to go the route of diplomacy instead; after all, Shirogane did save his life.

“Thank you, Shirogane.”

“I think by now you can call me Shiro,” Shirogane says, flashing another one of his crooked smiles.

  
  


* * *

  
  


Shirogane -  _ Shiro _ \- is naturally curious. Keith learns as much as they tread across rotting wooden floors in a damp basement. 

They’re still in Mombasa, in the shop of one of Lance’s friends. Keith and Shiro had picked up Lance from in front of the building where Keith had promised to meet, and Lance had shot Shiro one amused look before sliding into the front seat of the car. He asked no questions, only gave directions, something that had made Shiro visibly happy.

Hunk Garret runs a mildly popular breakfast joint on the main floor of his building and an extremely popular sedative experience in the basement. Shiro listens with rapt attention as Hunk explains how his sedatives can extend the amount of time one has in a dream a lot more than what the standard sedative can do. His most frequent customers are old men who come to get put under so that they can live a few days in their old lives again.

Hunk’s tight lipped on what exactly has made his sedative so strong, but he easily explains the concept of it to Shiro. “When you dream, time stretches out longer. An hour in the real world results in three in the dream world, five if you’re on a military-grade sedative.”

“And yours?” Shiro asks, bending down over the cot of a wizened old man. He waves a hand and taps his fingers against the wrinkled skin of the man to no reaction whatsoever.

“They come here to get put under for four hours at a stretch,” Hunk explains. “It gives them forty hours in the dream world to live out their glory days again.”

Shiro whistles low while Lance smacks the cheek of another sleeping man. Keith shoots him a glare and Lance bodily turns away from him, ignoring him.

“Why would someone want to do that?” Shiro asks and the answer comes out from Keith in an almost knee-jerk response.

“It’s the only way some of them can dream,” he says evenly as he stares at an empty cot. The sheet on top of it is folded neatly, its frayed ends poking out from underneath. “And for some of them, it’s the only time they feel like they’re truly living.”

“What a life,” Shiro says, seemingly more to himself. Keith looks up and sees Shiro looking at him through the dim light of the basement. It’s hard being looked at by someone so enigmatic so Keith turns on his heel to inspect another bed.

“It’s probably where you two are heading if you keep this work up,” Hunk says to Lance and Keith and Lance snorts and thumps Hunk on the back.

“We want you to come along on this one too,” he says cheerily. “So if you’re lucky enough, you’ll end up with the same problem.”

Hunk rolls his eyes and shakes him off, walking over to the empty bed. He pulls apart the folded blanket and uses it to dust the mattress before flourishing his hands towards it and nodding towards Keith.

“Wanna give it a go?” Hunk asks, and Keith finds himself automatically drifting towards the bed.

  
  


* * *

  
  


This dream is nothing new. And yet it makes his heart beat a wicked tattoo against his chest.

He watches his parents lay on a rail, clasping each other’s hands. They’re old, weathered. Keith is still young on the outside, always is. They don’t notice his presence whatsoever, too enraptured with each other. He watches his mother say something to his father but he can’t hear it. It’s too quiet over the rumbling noise of the approaching train.

Suddenly the scene changes and he’s waking up on the floor of his parent’s bedroom. His parents are sitting up, staring at him wordlessly. He reaches out to them and his father grasps his hand. His father’s hand is much larger than his; Keith’s no older than thirteen as he gets a warm smile from both his parents. He’s the only one here that knows he’s in a dream. Breathe in. Breathe out. 

In less than a fraction of a second, that warmth gets sucked out of the room like it’s been vacuumed. Both his parents look at him with terror. This is nothing new to him.

“What are you doing here?” his mother whispers, reaching out for him.The grip his father has on his hand tightens into something uncomfortable, and Keith feels familiar bile start to rise in his throat. 

Krolia says something else again, but it’s masked by the rumble and horn of a train. She turns to his husband, looks at him like he’s a stranger. Breathe in.

Keith’s father tries to yank Keith towards himself, eyes wide and fearful. 

“What have you done, Keith?” This, Keith can hear his father loud and clear. Keith can’t articulate it but he’s mature enough now to know what he did. He hates that his dreams never visit his happier times with his parents. Breathe out.

“I didn’t know,” Keith says in return but he knows it’ll never work. The look his parents give him morph into utmost betrayal and— and he’s been told so many times that it’s not what was on their faces, that they would never feel that way towards him no matter what they did. But that’s how they’re looking at him now, looking at their only son, their little intruder—

There’s a large horn blaring behind him and Keith turns just in time to see the front of a steam-engine train and—

Keith wakes up with a sharp gasp, startling everyone around him as he shoots up in the bed.

“Told you it’s heavy,” Hunk says, the egg timer in his hand dinging with the two minute mark. “How about it?”

He can’t find a reply. It’s potent enough for the job, Keith can say that much. But he’s still rattled by his dream, still rattled by the haunting look on his parents’ faces. With a sympathetic look and no questions, Hunk helps him remove the needle for the sedative and shows him where the washroom is.

Keith splashes cold water on his face and props one hand up on the cracked sink. He can’t bring himself to quite look in the mirror yet. He knows instead he’ll see his parents, he’ll see his father in his eyes and his mother in the set of his mouth and the trouble he caused lingering over him like a ghost.

With shaking hands, he digs into his pants pocket and retrieves the small spinning top he keeps secured in there. He’s too rattled to spin it properly and it falls off the porcelain ledge of the basin, clattering onto the ground. Keith scrambles for it and almost knocks his head on the sink when he hears a throat clear behind him.

“Are you okay, Keith?” comes Shiro’s voice from the doorway of the washroom. Keith spits out whatever whatever got in his mouth and looks over his shoulder at the other man. Shiro cuts a formidable figure, shrouded in darkness, the dull light of the washroom not quite reaching him.

There is concern in Shiro’s voice, but Keith thinks that’s less directed towards him as a person and more towards him as a contractor.

An investment, as it were.

“Yeah,” Keith says. “I’m fine.”

He takes a paper towel off the stack on the sink and wipes his face with it before heading towards the exit. Shiro watches him like a hawk and when Keith tries to cross him in the doorway, he stops him with a hand on his shoulder.

Shirogane is silent for a moment, hawk-like as always. Keith doesn’t squirm under his gaze but comes close. Instead, he focuses on maintaining eye contact, not wanting to show any sign of weakness.

“I will be coming along,” Shiro says and Keith frowns. 

“What do you mean?”

There’s no one around them but Shiro leans in anyways, talking in a low and quiet voice.

“When you plant the idea in Lotor’s head, I want to come along,” Shiro says and Keith bristles. 

“It requires training,” Keith says readily. “You can’t just jump into a dream with us. Who knows what will happen. We have to work with precision.”

“Then teach me,” Shiro replies. “This is a very important thing for me. I’d be more than happy to compensate you accordingly.”

Shiro releases him and gives him another genial smile before turning around, not giving Keith a chance to reply. Keith remains at the door, staring at him as he rejoins Hunk and Lance in the main den of the basement. Their conversation hadn’t exactly been private; Keith can see the other two men staring him and Shiro down as Keith trudges towards them.

“So when do we start?” Shiro asks in a cheerful way that belies his tone earlier. 

“With all due respect,” Lance starts, eyes flicking between Shiro and Keith. “There’s no room for tourists on this trip, Mr.Shirogane.”

Keith stiffens, but Shiro only gives him a warm look. He doesn’t look anywhere else but at Keith. Keith can feel the sharp edge of the blade that lies underneath the pleasant expression Shiro’s wearing. Keith knows he has less of a choice now than he did before. 

“By the end of this week, I don’t plan to be” Shiro says firmly, leaving no room for conversation. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'M SO SORRY FOR THE DELAY
> 
> I've been super busy with my personal life over the past month and a half and to be completely honest this is definitely one of the fics I need to take my time with because it's a personal challenge (in the best way) to write but I'm very happy you guys enjoyed it ahhh thank you!!!

Recruiting an architect for the job is surprisingly easy. It takes a trip to France to meet his old mentor, and Keith’s introduced to Samuel Holt’s plucky prodigal daughter. She’s just starting her graduate program and she’s the right combination of brilliance, stubbornness and curiosity. Holt says that she’s as good a student as Keith was, and Keith’s sure that he’s downplaying it out of politeness.

Pidge doesn’t ask about the job itself but wants to unfold the world of dream thievery as much as she possibly can before she starts building worlds in peoples’ minds. Keith pawns her off to Lance and Allura who take her to the warehouse in London where they’re doing their test runs with Hunk. He knows he should be walking her through the job in more detail himself, but he’s got another student that’s eager to learn.

Shiro sits across from him on the patio of a small cafe in Paris, dressed in a light grey suit and wearing one of his easy smiles. He stirs his coffee, small metal spoon clicking lightly against the ceramic cup while Keith’s own drink stays untouched. Keith idly watches a couple over Shiro’s shoulder lean into each other as Shiro speaks.

“So I’m still a little curious as to how this goes,” Shiro says and Keith’s gaze snaps back to him. “I’m not new to the idea of the dream world, but I’ve never really gotten a chance to hear how it works.”

Keith thinks Shiro might be lying. From the get go, Shiro seemed to know rather well what was going on. A man with that much money can get any answer he wants. Keith knows this is a thinly veiled test.

“It’s a simple concept,” Keith says, tugging a napkin out from under his plate. He pulls out a pen from the breast pocket of his leather jacket and flattens the paper out. He draws two inky arrows curved in a circle as he speaks. “When we dream, our brain creates the world around us as fast as it sees it. And it does it so seamlessly that we don’t even notice.”

Shiro is visibly focused on Keith’s hands as Keith draws a line through the middle of the circle. “Infiltrating a dream lands us right in the middle of that process of creation and perception and allows us to take it over.”

“When we’re all sedated, Pidge will build a world for us,” Keith continues, folding the napkin up. “A maze, as it were. Our mark will populate it with his subconscious, just like you populated your party when we ran that job on you.”

A plate clatters in the distance and Shiro sneaks a quick glance as the waitress repeatedly apologizes to a table near them.

“Some people are trained so that their subconscious will defend them against anyone trying to infiltrate them. They’ll normally manifest as your typical bodyguard,” Keith says and gives Shiro a pointed look. “But you already knew that, didn’t you?”

Shiro doesn’t reply for a moment, just looks at Keith. Keith’s gotten used to the scrutinizing glances but there’s still something about those piercing brown eyes that makes him squirm. He’s not exactly asking for a secret from Shiro but Keith can tell that Shiro is treating it like one. Keith waits another beat and when it’s apparent Shiro won’t reply, he continues on. 

“Lotor doesn’t seem to be a man that wouldn’t have that type of training,” Keith moves on, but Shiro doesn’t break eye contact. “So we have to be vigilant and precise in how we carry out the job. We have to make sure that he doesn’t pick up on the fact that he’s in a dream otherwise things can go south fast.”

“Too much familiarity leads to trouble,” Shiro says thoughtfully and Keith makes a non-committal noise. “Like when you tried to infiltrate my dream.”

“I normally don’t like to do that. It’s much more of a risk than creating a brand new world out of your imagination,” Keith replies. “When you try to recreate real life, the smallest detail can turn your mark onto what you’re doing.”

“Such as using a polyester carpet instead of a wool one,” Shiro whips and Keith snorts. 

“We’ll have a better architect,” Keith replies. “I’ve already done a run with Pidge and she builds a dream like no other.”

Shiro narrows his eyes, but sits back in his chair. He looks lost in contemplation for a moment, dark brows pinched together as he stares at the table in front of them. It’s selfish but Keith takes this moment to look at him, look at the cut of his clean shaven jaw and wonder how this man came to hear of him. Keith knows he’s got a reputation but it’s been a long time since someone this powerful has crossed his path intentionally. Shiro has been the most hands-on client Keith’s had, and he’s not sure how to feel about it. 

“If Lotor has training,” Shiro says finally. “He’ll be able to find out quickly if he’s in a dream. Are you sure you’ll be able to convince him for long enough?”

Keith’s not surprised at the question but he purses his lips anyways. He bites back any urge to point out exactly how long he had Shiro hooked when they were sleeping on the Shinkansen. Instead he says, “Our last architect might have missed a tiny detail and we didn’t anticipate you catching it. But I don’t make the same mistake twice.”

“I’m not doubting you,” Shiro replies and Keith knows he’s not. Shiro has already invested time and money in this and Keith knows that men like him cut the cord the moment they feel any sort of discomfort. 

“Lotor’s subconscious will undoubtedly give us hell,” Keith says. “And we’re going to be taking a different approach with him. Whatever we did to you will pale in comparison.”

It’s unclear whether it’s skepticism or curiosity on Shiro’s face so Keith leans in. Shiro mirrors him and for the first time, Keith finds himself being the one to give a rakish grin. “Dreams feel real when you’re in them, right?” Shiro nods. “So we need to continuously make sure that our mark believes that what they’re in at the moment is reality. Not everyone is as sharp as you, Mr. Shirogane.”

Shiro’s a hard man to read and Keith can’t tell if the man is buying what he’s saying. He looks like he’s still waiting for Keith to show him something more.

“You ever remember the beginning of a dream?” Keith asks, sitting back in his chair. Shiro frowns before he shakes his head. “No, you’re dropped in the middle of it, right?”

“Yes,” Shiro agrees and Keith nods along as he continues.

“Do you remember how we got here, Shiro?” Keith says. The nickname still feels slightly strange dropping from his mouth but nonetheless he uses it. He waits for Shiro to try and trace back his route to the cafe that they’re sitting at. When it’s clear that he can’t, Keith’s grin widens with some real satisfaction behind it.

It takes a second before realization dawns like light on Shiro’s face and his expression falls away in favour of— awe. Keith expected frustration, indignance, maybe. Some sort of anger. Shiro looks like he’s found something new. “Are we dreaming?”

“Are we?” Keith parrots back, just as the table beneath them starts to rattle. It’s hard enough to send some of Keith’s untouched coffee splashing outside of the mug. 

The couple behind them keeps talking and the waitress ducks around a chair that gets knocked over. She shoots a dirty look at Keith and Keith ignores it, focusing on Shiro. Shiro swivels around in his seat to stare out onto the cobblestone roads around the cafe. People walk by, staring down Keith as the rattling grows louder and the entire ground starts to rumble.

“We’re not in Paris, are we?” Shiro murmurs and Keith shakes his head.

“No,” he replies. “We’re in a warehouse in London right now.”

To emphasize his point, Keith makes the storefront of the bookshop across the street explode. The shop glass bursts out in front of them, sending books flying out the window as the building around it starts to burst out as well. There’s dirt and rubble everywhere and Keith makes sure that he slows down the debris till it’s suspended mid-air.

For the sake of really getting it across, Keith shatters more windows that line the building around them. Glass shards get sent everywhere, glimmering under the afternoon sun, suspended like diamonds. Keith makes sure to disperse a few fruit stalls as well, showing off a little.

“What the-” Shiro starts, but Keith makes the inside of the very cafe they’re sitting at detonate.

By the time Keith’s waking up with a sharp inhale, Lance is already crouched at Shiro’s side with a glass of water. 

“I felt that,” Shiro says, sounding stunned. His chest heaves hard and he wipes the side of his mouth. “The pain feels so real.”

“Death will wake you up but pain won’t,” Keith says, voice cracking through his dry throat. “Though that shouldn't be new to you."

“Give Allura my apologies.” Shiro says and Keith might be imagining the hint of reticence in his voice. 

“Another five minutes, boss?” Lance asks, cutting through their conversation. Keith hums in contemplation while Shiro’s eyes widen.

“Five minutes?” Shiro exclaims, giving each of them an incredulous look. “We were in there for over an hour!”

“Hunk’s potion is stronger than whatever’s on the market right now,” Keith explains. “And way, way stronger than any natural dream.”

“I…” Shiro trails off and Keith tries not to look too smug. Shiro’s cellphone rings, startling all three of them and he looks at it with distaste when he pulls out.

“We’re not done yet,” Shiro tells Keith as he picks up his phone and stands up. “Shirogane here.”

“Tell him to get a totem,” Keith instructs Lance as he sits up and brushes off his jacket. Lance raises an eyebrow. “I need to go check in with Allura.”

“You sure you want to give up one on one time with the big boss?” Lance asks and Keith rolls his eyes, pointedly not looking at where Shiro’s saying something hushed into his phone, back turned on the two. 

With the amount of prying Shiro likes to do, Keith’s sure this won’t be his last opportunity.

* * *

They have a busy week in London, preparing for and fine tuning the details of the job. The team works on finding out how exactly they’re going to carry out this task while Lance spends a majority of his time working as a personal assistant to Dayak, one of the executives at GALRA engineering.

It’s a little known fact that she’s Lotor’s godmother; she had stepped in as his surrogate parent when his mother died and his father had gone cold with grief. Lance is good at picking up intricacies of a relationship as long as it doesn’t involve him, and has placed himself in a position where he can pick up enough detail for the job. And the relationship between Dayak and Lotor is loaded.

“She’s more of a parent to him than his father is,” Keith says, standing in front of a large whiteboard with Lotor and Dayak’s name scribbled in the middle. They’ve had many of these meetings, trying to strike a balance between fast and meticulous work. “In his inner circle, it’s well known that he values her opinion above all. She’s the key to turning a business strategy into an emotion.”

The strategy being that Lotor will break up his father’s empire. They’re still searching out what it is exactly that they need to plant in Lotor, what seed will grow into the idea that they need. They can read all the body language they want but they need to be prepared for anything.

Hours are spent trying to dissolve the idea into a human feeling, with half the team wanting to inspire it in Lotor through spite. Keith thinks that positive emotion has stronger roots than negative emotion and if they lead Lotor to some sort of catharsis, he’ll play right into their hand.

Keith explains as much to Shiro in another dream he builds for them.

There’s no dramatic explosions like last time. Keith sets them atop a rooftop lounge in Cappadocia, the golden sun eternally setting as giant hot-air balloons rise against the blood-red sky.

“If we treat the idea like a revelation it has a higher chance of sticking,” Keith says, perched on a plush cushion. Shiro sits across the glass table, illuminated by the sunset. “Especially if the revelation comes from the relationship he has with his father.”

“Or the lack of,” Shiro points out, and Keith shakes his head. 

“It’s there,” Keith says quietly. “We would know if it’s not. Even if it’s negative, any sort of relationship counts.”

“Yeah?” Shiro raises an eyebrow before looking out into the distance. Keith’s tempted to screw around and make two of the large balloons in the distance crash, just to get a reaction out of Shiro. A few start to drift dangerously close together but Shiro interrupts before he can do anything.

“How did you even get started in this line of business?” Shiro asks him, squinting at Keith.

“My parents,” Keith replies simply— it’s all he’s going to give Shiro. The balloons start to drift away from each other again and the sky grows fractionally darker. He can't make up his mind whether he wants the night sky to be blue or a vibrant purple. “Did you make a totem?”

Shiro digs through the breast pocket of his thin white dress-shirt before pulling out a black onyx and gold banded die. Keith leans forward, reaching out for it and Shiro closes his hand before Keith can even brush his fingers over it.

“Good,” Keith remarks, sitting back. “Never let anyone touch your totem.”

Only a totem’s owner knows the true weight, feel of it, and if it’s off they know they’re in someone else’s dream. If it’s correct, they’re in reality. It’s also correct in one’s own dream but Keith likes to skip over that part when he can.

“Do you want to walk?” Keith asks, and Shiro nods. There’s a loud whining and clanking noise as a large iron bridge materializes, stretching out from the balcony they’re sitting on.

“You could live a thousand lives like this,” Shiro says in awe as the bridge groans and grinds and stretches out through the hills and into the horizon. 

“Many do,” Keith replies, slowly getting to his feet. He dusts off his jeans and stretches a hand out to help Shiro up. Shiro grabs it but barely uses it as he too stands up on his feet. They linger with their hands clasped and Shiro asks him— “How many have you lived?”

Keith lets go of him, doesn’t answer. Only returns Shiro’s gaze for a moment before he steps over the glass coffee table and towards the railing of the balcony. He hears Shiro’s heavy footsteps as he follows Keith close behind, over the railing and onto the dark wrought-iron bridge. It’s just wide enough for the two of them, and there’s no visible end of it. 

For the hell of it, Keith lifts a breeze into the air. He feels like a god like this, and he has to admit that it’s nice to have someone new who is impressed by his tricks, even if it won’t last long. 

He turns back to look at Shiro, who’s swiveling on his heel as he walks, trying to take in as much of the sights as possible. Pink light washes over him and for a brief moment, he looks more like a curious boy than the president of one of the largest energy companies in the world. Balloons hang above them, baskets suspended mid air and never moving. 

Keith tries to gauge Shiro and think of something that would impress him. He’s not sure why he has the urge; he’s done enough already, making the landscape extend as they walk down the bridge. But the faint yet genuine smile on Shiro’s face makes him want to show off just a little more. 

Maybe he feels Shiro is showing some sort of vulnerability. But Shiro seems like an impenetrable man, even when he looks like he has his guard down. 

He draws a blank though— and in the distance, he can hear the soft hum of music. 

“I want to build a dream,” Shiro says to Keith, and the music starts to swell. Keith stops in his tracks to look at Shiro, illuminated by the sunset, silhouetted by colourful hot air balloons. 

“What would you build?” Keith says, has to yell because the music is loud now. 

“I don’t know,” Shiro calls out, and starts to walk towards Keith. “I—“

Not for the first time, Keith feels something akin to yearning when he wakes up. 

* * *

They come across a break midway through the week, a break that Allura and Lance deliver standing in an empty marble courtyard. The statues that crest over the entrance are intricate if not anachronistic and Ornate engravings line the pool that they stand around. Crystal blue water shimmers under the sunlight and there’s a cage with songbirds chirping in the distance. It’s the prettiest thing Pidge has built yet. 

“In the first dream, the initial level, we will need to open up his mind,” Allura says and Keith watches the checkered floor move just an infinitesimal amount underneath their feet. 

“ _I_ _will not follow in my father’s footsteps,_ ” Lance says, raising his hand before Keith voices an objection. “It’s not a negative thought. It’s neutral. We’re going to build on it as we travel deeper.”

“ _I will create something for myself_ ,” Allura continues. “That’s the idea we need to plant on the second level of his dream. That’s the one we want his subconscious suggesting to himself.”

“It’s more positive,” Lance supplies, striding across the marble floor. His shoes echo loudly, the air of the room dead around them. “It also allows us more leeway in pushing him towards his so-called catharsis.”

“ _My father does not want me to be him_ ,” Allura finishes. “By the time we get to the last level of his dream, his subconscious should pull him towards the idea with little suggestion from us. How it does that will be dictated by our actions on all three levels.”

Keith gives an approving hum and Shiro shoots him a pleased look from where he’s standing across the pool. Keith likes to pretend that Shiro is looking at the other four as much as he is looking at Keith, even though it’s him that Shiro’s focusing all his positive reactions onto.

“I’ve studied Dayak thoroughly,” Lance says and within a blink, he’s taken form of the tall and formidable woman whose face is so stern it looks like no love can come through. “I’ve picked up her habits, her behaviour, both physical and emotional.”

It’s becoming increasingly clear that the more his father deteriorates, the more Lotor is turning to Dayak as the authoritative figure in his life. She is the vessel for which they’re going to deliver their ideas and they’re banking on Lotor thinking his realization will be organic.

The only other major problem they face now is getting a busy man in one place for an extended amount of time.

“Is he due for any other procedures?” Keith’s standing at the top of a long set of stairs, pinching the bridge of his nose. This time they’re in the empty hallway of a neo-modern hotel, one of Hunk’s creations. It’s a day later and they just found out that their go-time for the mission has just been thrown up in the air— Lotor’s rescheduled a knee operation that they had been banking on.

“We’ll find a way,” Lance supplies, sitting on the smooth hardwood railing at the bottom of the stairs. “I’m sure we can make something happen.”

Keith’s about to tell Lance that _that_ might be veering into territory he doesn’t want to venture into but thankfully, Shiro cuts in. 

“He makes a trip from London to Sydney near the end of every month,” Shiro says. “One flight should be good enough, right?”

“Lotor flies private,” Pidge says, and Shiro shrugs like it’s not a problem.

“Not if his plane needed some emergency repairs,” Shiro says in the same casual voice Lance had used before. “I know what airline he has a preference for.”

Pidge looks like there’s about a hundred things she wants to say but can’t decide which to say first; Allura raises a manicured eyebrow, while Lance and Hunk both cough. Keith remains unaffected, on the outside anyways.

“The flight would need to be on something like a 747,” Keith finally says. “The first class cabins are on top so we don’t risk people walking through.”

“Well,” Allura hums. “We would need to buy out the attendants and the pilots. Hell, to be safe we might need to buy out the entire flight.”

“I bought the entire airline,” Shiro says simply, and everyone falls into a pin drop silence as they stare at him. He looks at Keith, like Keith’s going to justify this. “...it seemed neater.”

Four sets of eyes turn towards Keith at this, and Keith can’t help it. For the first time in a while, he finds himself breaking into a genuine grin while everyone else raises their eyebrows. He feels the ghost of that grin on his face when they wake up, while Hunk and Pidge mutter about men that are too rich for their own good.

“Hey,” Lance nudges Keith from where he was sitting beside him. “Does he kind of scare you? Because he kind of scares me.”

Keith watches as Shiro pushes up from his chair, rolling his head to work out the kinks in his neck. He asks Allura if she’s okay, if she needs water, asks if she can tell him how long they were under for. Keith sees the way Shiro turns around the simplest questions about himself in a way where it sounds like he’s very attentive towards others. 

“I don’t know,” Keith replies. “I can’t tell.”

The answer may not be honest, not fully. Because Keith knows that Shiro is warm and friendly and anything but open, keeping as much of himself a guarded as possible. Keith knows that beneath the expensive suits and the sharp charisma lies someone who is a kindred spirit. And some part of Keith knows that if he tries to find out what kind of man Shiro is, that if he attempts to dig, he might just come face to face with a mirror instead.  


* * *

  
  
Yet Keith would be a liar if he said he didn’t have any curiosity so one early morning, before anyone else arrives at the warehouse, he gets Shiro to build him a dream. It’s definitely a guise to see what part of himself Shiro will reveal, but Keith doesn’t know what to make of it when he finds himself standing on vast, endless plane.

Every single time Keith’s taken someone under to be an architect of a dream for the first time, they recreate a place familiar to them. The most common is their childhood home, their university, the place where they met a love they have or they have lost. Keith gives them a lecture on how you can’t build a dream based on what you know, just in case your ghosts show up, and they go from there. He’s not, however, had someone build something like this on their first go.

He thinks Shiro has put a bioluminescent ocean underneath them; bright blue and green creatures drift in the dark waters, and Keith’s feet make no sound as he slowly walks along what seems like a glass floor. Stars stretch out above them, littering the rich blue sky with no real sense behind them. In the distance, a moon rises, large and bright and preternatural. The craters are detailed and Keith can’t fully comprehend what kind of ether Shiro’s placed them in.

“You’re a fascinating man, Shirogane,” Keith allows himself to say as he slowly walks in a circle around Shiro, looking around the world he’s built. Shiro laughs good-naturedly.

“One could say that about you as well,” he throws back and Keith makes an ambivalent noise.

“Not really,” Keith murmurs, watching as a shooting star streaks across the sky. "I just have a fascinating job."

That elicits another chuckle from Shiro who continues to stand, hand in his pockets like he’s waiting for Keith to deliver a verdict. Keith cranes his head, looking for any hint of his subconscious but it hasn't seemed to populate the dream. Not yet anyways.“This is nice.”

“I was hoping for more than nice,” Shiro replies, and Keith looks over his shoulder at him. He raises an eyebrow at Shiro and hears a rumble in the distance, followed by a loud _CRACKCRACKCRACK_ of breaking glass. The loud boom that follows is strong enough that Keith immediately goes into a defensive mode, throwing his arm up over his face. He spins and grabs Shiro with all intent to take him out and shield him, but he’s steadied by two large hands on his shoulders.

“Woah,” Shiro says, frowning. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.”

Keith shakes him off and steps back, narrowing his eyes at Shiro. Shiro raises his hands in apology but Keith still feels his heart thudding. Hunk’s sedative must be getting stronger because a sound wave that large in a dream would have been enough to wake them up.

“It’s okay,” Keith says, even though he’s acutely aware of his own presence in this dream. He turns on his heel to see a large tower emerging in the distance; it’s a nondescript building with one flickering fluorescent light in one of the middle floors. “I can’t gauge what type of imagination you have.”

“This isn’t what I dream of regularly,” Shiro says, and starts to walk towards the building. It’s a distance away but Keith follows anyways out of curiosity. There’s a peeling billboard on top of the building, a faded Japanese advertisement for a drink Keith can’t figure out. The sole light in the window flickers briefly.

“What do you dream of regularly?” Keith asks, and Shiro shrugs as he takes long strides.

“I don’t,” Shiro replies. “I prefer not to.”

They come to a halt a hundred feet away from the building, and Keith’s curiosity is piqued, whether from the building or Shiro’s statement. He’s not going to ask about either though, because he thinks it’ll be a fruitless task.

“If I…” Shiro trails off, looking at the building contemplatively. His face has gone soft, lit from underneath by the glowing creatures that swim below them. “I could destroy this.”

“You could,” Keith agrees. “You could turn it into dust if you want to. You can raise up ten more if you want.”

“Could you destroy it?” Shiro turns to look at him and Keith shakes his head. He wouldn’t even try. 

It’s on the tip of Keith’s tongue to ask what the building is and by the look on Shiro’s face, it looks like he’s waiting for Keith to say it. And so—

“Did you want to destroy it?” Keith asks, breaking eye contact with him to look at the building again. Shiro snorts, shifts on his feet, and the distant light in the window flickers out.

“Many times,” he replies and Keith tries not to feel some sort of victory at the revelation. “Can we go down another level?”

“I don’t know,” Keith says. “I’m not sure how much time it would be with this version of the sedative and I don’t want to try before I talk to Hunk.”

Keith is definitely a skilled enough chemist that he could take put them down in another dream and they’d be fine. He just doesn’t know how long they’d be down under for. But there’s something overwhelming about the thought of being with Shiro for so long in a liminal space that Keith doesn’t know if he’s actually averse to.

“My security detail in my dreams were trained by Marmora,” Shiro says, and Keith blinks in surprise. 

That’s all he’ll give though, because he doesn’t want to visibly show what kind of ache that brings from within him. He clenches one of his hands, taps it against the side of his thigh. One of the glowing creatures underneath them thuds dully against the glass.

But if Shiro got his security detail trained by Marmora, if Shiro is offering passage back to America for Keith then-

“I’ve watched you for a while,” Shiro gives the answer before Keith can pose the question. Keith’s fingernails dig into the meat of his palm and he trains his eyes on the single light in the building. “They recommended you in high regard for this job.”

“You told them about this job?” Keith asks roughly, and Shiro makes a noise in the negative.

“Not the specifics, no,” Shiro replies. “Just that I needed someone highly trained and good at being discreet.”

Keith doesn’t need to ask whether Shiro knows why he left Marmora. Pain pangs within Keith like a small broken bell he’s long tried to muffle. He nods, unable to formulate any other kind of response because if Shiro knows about Marmora then Keith already feels more vulnerable than before. It’s not that the others don’t know; it’s not something Keith’s kept a secret. But it’s so deeply entrenched in failure that knowing that Shiro knows makes him feel some kind of shame that makes him want to shy away.

Another creature smacks against the glass floor, this time so loud that Keith can practically feel Shiro startle beside him. There’s the unmistakable sound of glass fracturing and Keith thinks he knows where his subconscious went. For Shiro to be able to section it away from Keith is incredibly powerful and Keith wonders how much of it is actually fool’s luck.

“You know,” Keith finally says, before he ends up going down into a tailspin. “If I succeed in your mission but you can’t keep your promise, I’m a dead man as soon as I land on American soil.”

“I know,” Shiro replies quietly. “But I can keep my promise. I’m a man that pulls my strings in advance, Keith.”

Another surprise. Keith’s not an idiot and knows exactly what Shiro means. He turns to look at Shiro, eyes going wide. Shiro looks like he knows exactly what he’s exposed, yet doesn’t look uncomfortable about it.

“I hope that you keep up your end of the deal though,” Shiro says plainly, and for all intents and purposes, Keith should take that as a not-so-subtle reminder. _Whatever I will give you, I can easily take away_. “It would be a shame to get this far for nothing.”

“I will,” Keith says almost immediately, fully turning his body towards Shiro. “I have faith in my team.”

“As do I,” Shiro says, and he sounds honest. “Though I do think they fear me.”

Keith can't even be taken aback at the statement. It has more than a modicum of truth.

“You heard,” Keith says simply, and Shiro nods. 

“Even if Lance attempts to be quiet, I don’t think he can be,” Shiro offers and Keith presses his lips in a tight line. “What I do want to know though, Keith, is if _you_ fear me.”

Shiro moves to face Keith as well, staring him down in the ambient glow of his dream. Keith’s acutely aware of the lack of distance between them but keeps himself steady as he looks at Shiro.

“I don’t,” Keith says bluntly. Or maybe he does, but not because of Shiro’s power or because of what Shiro can or cannot do. “Do you want me to?”

Shiro opens his mouth, but the faint familiar strain of music starts to fill their plane of existence. He looks almost frustrated and closes his eyes, sighing through his nose. Keith watches him closely, studies the knitted skin of the scar across his face. He can feel the weight of the spinning top in his pocket but he doesn’t reach for it quite yet.

Seeing him like this almost feels like he’s seeing Shiro exposed, seeing him raw but— Keith knows that even this kind of vulnerability can be calculated. 

“I would like to think that at the least, you would consider me a friend,” Shiro says finally, before the sound swells and they snap awake.

* * *

They’ve yet to find the right time to get Lotor so they’ve been honing as much of the mission as possible. Hunk has developed a sedative so strong and selective that most disturbances that would normally wake someone up will only jolt them at the worst. The only way to wake anyone up in the dream is through the sensation of falling; even death will not pull them from sleep but that's something Keith has asked Hunk to not share with the team. Not yet, anyways.

“The compound we’re using to create the link between all of us is strong, given that there’s going to be seven of us,” Hunk says one night as the team sits circled around a table full of golden vials. “So it’s also going to kick our brain into overdrive. The sedative I’m mixing it with is also going to be more potent than anything I’ve given you guys so far so uh, if you’re not used to what I have so far, the kickback when you wake up might be a lot.”

If they spend ten hours sedated, the first dream will feel like a week. The second dream will feel like six months and the dream within _that_ dream will feel like ten years. Shiro and Allura take it in stride, while Lance looks at Hunk a little dubiously. Pidge looks like for the first time, she might have some doubts.

“And how are we planning to wake up once we’ve planted the idea?” Allura asks. “A week’s fine but I doubt we want to be stuck with each other for ten years."

“I think we’d make fun roommates,” Lance winks at her. Allura rolls her eyes before she turns to Keith.

“Something more elegant than shooting me in the head, I’m hoping?” she asks and Keith folds his arms over his chest before he replies. Shiro catches the action and Keith wouldn’t be surprised if he caught the way his mouth tightened briefly either. He’s been watching Keith like a hawk the entire meeting.

When they had woken up from their shared dream in the morning, Shiro wore a faraway look for a better portion of an hour. He hadn’t spoken much, not to Keith or anyone else, but Keith had been the only one to notice. Shiro had reached some sort of resolve by the middle of the day and had returned to his normal, inquisitive sharp nature by the evening. However, if Keith thought Shiro had been focused on him before, it’s nothing compared to the way that his gaze burns into him now.

“A kick,” Keith replies, training his eyes on the floor. “We’ll use music to coordinate the sensation of falling across all three levels. It’ll help us wake back up in the very first level of the dream. Hopefully, we can survive a week with each other.” 

The joke comes out stilted and poorly delivered, but Hunk still gives a good-natured laugh at it. Keith can tell Shiro’s waiting for him to say something more but Keith decides to let it go. When the team disbands and says their goodbyes, Shiro stands up as well instead of lingering back to talk to Keith. Keith waves them all away till they leave him alone at the table, staring down the empty spot where Hunk’s vial tray had been sitting.

Keith thinks about putting himself under. Just for ten minutes. Just to work out some of the lingering rawness he feels from the dream he shared with Shiro. When he watches Hunk tinker at the chemist’s station in the warehouse, he thinks about taking enough of the substance for an entire night.

He can’t though because he knows what he’ll dream of. Keith knows what kind of tide will inevitably drag him under into the depths of an old, old pain. Keith is sometimes glad that he can no longer dream on his own, not without the help of compounds like the one Hunk makes. Others in his line of work chase fragments of it but the emptiness of his mind at night comforts him.

It’s the few hours he’s not constantly plagued with what is, has, could have been. Keith does not trust himself to not recreate his demons in his dreams, doesn’t trust himself to not get taken in by his projections no matter how grotesque they get. Doesn’t trust himself to not make the same mistakes that he made many, many years ago in an attempt to get a do-over.

Keith could take someone under with him, someone to watch over him. But as much as his friends will offer out of the kindness of their hearts, no one will want to be a glorified babysitter for a man whose subconscious is a lot more volatile than he lets on.

A small voice in the back of his head suggests asking the man who somehow seemed to successfully create a physical barrier between Keith and his own subconscious. Keith does not know what the Marmora are showing their clients nowadays, but he’s never seen that kind of ability from a civilian before.

If he goes under for just five minutes he should be fine, Keith thinks. But he reminds himself that he’s done a lot worse in a lot lesser amount of time. 

Keith also reminds himself that he’s really not the type to run away.


	3. Chapter 3

Small waves lap around his feet, the coolness of the water welcome under the heat of the afternoon sun. Sitting on the beach in a suit isn’t the most practical thing to do, especially since the sand is already seeping into uncomfortable places. But Keith doesn’t care because he’s alone in the warmth and enjoying the soft breeze that drifts through his hair.

Keith forgets how good places like this are for being alone with his thoughts. He also keeps forgetting how much time it gives him to think even though right now, he doesn’t seem to be able to think about anything. Keith looks at the expanse of water yawning out in front of him, the light blue glittering in the sunlight. 

He can’t recall the name of the cove where he is, doesn’t even know if it’s real. But it doesn’t matter. Nor does it matter how beautiful the lush vegetation lining the divide between the beach and the cliffs look. Keith knows he’s made a mistake being here, of going under without any support. It’s a mistake he’s made more than once.

There’s a loud  _ thud _ and scrape the next wave that brushes up along the coast brings a feeling of anxiety with it. Keith swallows and looks over his shoulder. 

The beach seems bigger now.

In the distance, there’s a tall dark brown box standing in the sand. It’s monolithic and when Keith blinks, the front is replaced by the familiar grate of an ornate elevator door. Keith wonders what will happen if he ignores it. He’s never been able to in the past though. He doubts he will be able to now.

He turns back to look at the water, staring out into the Pacific. Keith’s not sure of how much time he has left in the dream, but he contemplates just sitting here till he wakes up. He thinks he can meditate for the hours, days he’ll be in here. Keith can’t recall how long he’s put himself under for.

There’s another loud scraping sound that causes the hairs on the back of his neck to stand up. In the distance, someone calls his name. Keith closes his eyes as he hears the familiar strain of his mother’s voice drift from behind him. 

_ Keith _ , she calls.

He knows when he turns around, she won’t be there. Knows if he follows the sound, she won’t be there. Knows that the timbre of her voice in this dream is all wrong, that he doesn’t actually remember how she sounds like. Keith tries to focus on the feeling of damp sand underneath him, waits for the coolness of the rolling wave along the shoreline. It never comes. He should have known better.

Keith opens his eyes and he’s standing inside a worn-down elevator. The wall paper is outdated and peeling, the buttons-half faded. The lightbulb overhead doesn’t work; the inside is lit through the white sun light that’s kind enough to pour in.

Through the grates, he can see the beach with its lazy waves and lack of any living being. Keith lurches forward to grab the grates of the door but there’s a soft  _ ding _ and the elevator starts to grind and groan. Keith knows he’s stuck. He always is. He tries to rattle the grates anyways. 

The elevator starts to sink into the sand like it’s meant to be there, going dark as it descends down into the earth. Trepidation rises in his throat— Keith knows what happens next. For all intents and purposes, he should be used to it by now.

Yet, as the elevator slows to a halt on a dimly lit hallway, Keith can’t tamp down on the nervousness that washes over him. He can’t stop himself when the elevator grates fold open to the side on their own either.

His shoes make no sound as he steps out into the dull fluorescent light. The place is not a stranger to him but he still feels the creeping unfamiliarity as he walks almost hypnotically to the large black door at the end of the long hallway. He places a palm on the heavy wood when he reaches it and feels it vibrate under his palm like a living creature. Keith steps forward, pushes it open and—

— gasps awake on the cold surgical steel of an operating table, heart racing a mile a minute. Keith rips off the surgical mask he’s wearing as the lights above burn into his eyes with the intensity of a sun. Faceless people - no, not faceless, these people had been his family for years up until this moment - crowd him, ask him what’s happening as he sits up, ask him why Thace and Regris woke up but both he and the mark did not. Keith tries to push them out of the way but it’s too late—

Their mark, a statuesque woman who is currently spearheading the privatization of a new type of super-drug, wakes up thrashing. She  _ screams _ and Keith remembers her name, remembers Hira, remembers how she had gotten killed in the dream and fallen into a liminal space Remembers how he searched for her in the infinite of a crumbling dream world. 

She launches off the surgical table, screeching again as the IV needle shifts in her. Two nurses pin her down and she kicks her legs, screaming something about not knowing where she is. Keith looks on in horror as he realizes he’s too late,  _ again _ , horror that’s mirrored in his mentor’s face.

“What did you do?” Kolivan grabs Keith by the shoulders. It’s not rough but there’s a clear line of worry in the action. “What happened to Hira?”

“She—” She got hit by a train in the dream, a train that wasn’t even supposed to be there. It was an anomaly, had shocked Thace and Regris because they had been in the courtyard of Versailles, trying to run a job on Hira before a locomotive thundered through the area, sending marble flying everywhere.

Keith had told Regris and Thace to stay, because the sedative they had in the real world was similar to Hunk’s in that they would not be able to wake up via death. Keith turned a gun on himself and went to where dreamers went when they were killed in a dream where they couldn’t wake up from— limbo. Nothing but raw subconscious, an empty space where one could be trapped for  _ years _ , depending on how long they have been sedated for.

Hira had died in the dream when there was only five minutes left on the clock in the real world. Keith hadn’t been able to find her in time and after spending years in nothingness, waking up in the real world had scrambled her in such a jarring way that to this day, she’s barely halfway through her recovery. 

Keith doesn’t know how exactly the Marmora team had dealt with the fallout. By the time someone had sedated Hira again, he had been hustled off the surgical table he had been lying on.

"Don’t go home,” Kolivan says as he roughly hauls Keith towards the back door in the operating room. “Go straight to the airport. Antok will meet you there with your passport and belongings. You need to leave the country before Altea Corp. puts a hit on you.”

Before Keith can say anything, the door swings open and he’s shoved back into the elevator he rode in on. The ornate grate is gone as Kolivan slams the door shut on him, and it’s the last memory Keith has of the man.

He smacks one of the buttons on the elevator door, cursing as he strains, trying to hear music over the blood rushing through his ears. Keith mashes the plastic  _ 5 _ button again, the highest number available, but the elevator descends with a loud groan into darkness. 

Keith bangs on the door, but the elevator keeps dropping till he’s swathed in pitch black. The sound of the elevator wires screeching grows louder and louder and Keith’s heart is in his throat as he keeps banging on the door.

He steps back, keeping one hand behind him while he rocks back on his feet before launching forward. Keith lands his foot against the door with a loud  _ CRACK  _ and it swings open, bursting into his parents’ bedroom. He loses his balance but even then, there’s no mercy because he doesn’t fall and wake himself up in the kinder first level of his dream.

The room is bathed in the soft orange glow of the rising sun. Keith sees his mother and his father laying side by side on the floor, fingers gently linked as their chests rise and fall with their shallow breaths. They’re sleeping, sedated for a few more hours, completely unaware of their son curled up against his mother’s side.

Keith panics when he sees the younger version of himself, the naive teenager holding onto his mother’s arm as he sleeps as well, as he dreams alongside his parents. 

He’s been told to be kinder to his past self. To be more forgiving, more accepting. Keith feels none of these things as he darts towards the younger version of himself. He crouches down and tries to shake him awake but the drug is too strong. Keith shakes again, hard this time, stomach churning at the way his own head lolls in his sedated state.

“What are you doing?” Keith throat rasps with the words, dry and cracking. “Wake up!  _ Wake up! _ ”

Still nothing. As if the younger version does not want to wake up. As if fourteen year old Keith wants to do nothing more than live a happy life with his parents in the dream world, just like they do in the real world. Keith lets out a guttural sound and suddenly he thinks he gets an inkling of how Hira felt, waking up into existence after spending an eternity in darkness—

A large horn blares in the distance and the room starts to rumble. His family is still asleep, unbothered by the way the pictures on the wall rattle with the tremors. Keith shakes younger him again, tries to get him to wake up, feels his eyes burn and start to grow wet with desperation. He opens his mouth, starts to yell something but it’s drowned out by the sound of the oncoming train and—

Someone grabs him by the collar and hauls him up to his feet, yanking him back so hard that it chokes Keith.

“Wh-” Keith starts but he’s being pulled back into the elevator as a steam locomotive barrels into his parents room. The door of the elevator slides shut and it starts to ascend, plunging him into darkness with whoever has intruded into his dream. He tries to reach out for them, feels the padded finely woven wool under his palm.

And when the elevator reaches all the way up, when they emerge on the beach again and the sunlight filters in, Keith isn’t surprised to see Shiro’s shocked face.

Instead, he’s  _ livid _ .

“What the hell are you doing here?” he demands as they stumble out of the elevator and onto the white sand. “You’re not supposed to be here!” 

“I came to the warehouse early,” Shiro attempts to put his hands up in a placating manner. “I got curious.”

“Curious about  _ what _ ?” Keith runs both his hands through his hair, not sure if he can fully make eye contact with Shiro. He feels raw and open like this in a way that he doesn’t want to. “What is it that you really want to know?”

“I just wanted to see-” Shiro says, and Keith turns on his heel. He stomps towards the water, hears Shiro try to catch up behind him. The sun hanging above them is still bright, yet the entire landscape seems dull like it’s hanging behind a hazy cloud. The godforsaken music  _ still _ hasn’t started to play yet and not seeing anywhere else to go, Keith starts walking directly into the ocean.

“Keith!” Shiro calls out again and Keith doesn’t bother turning around. “Keith, wait—!”

The water is cool around him as he kicks off his shoes and pulls off his socks, tossing them off to the side. Keith walks into the water, paying no mind to how it starts to soak the bottom of his pants. There’s a loud splash behind him and on instinct, Keith whips his head around to look at Shiro stumbling into the waves. 

Even in the dream, Shiro is dressed in an impeccable grey suit. He pulls off the jacket and throws it into the water, presumably to get to Keith easier. There’s no point, because the water isn’t going to beyond knee-deep, no matter how many miles they walk out into it.

“Keith, I didn’t know I was going to intrude,” Shiro tries again, and this time it gets Keith to stop around for good.

“How many secrets are left hidden from you?” Keith throws back at him, and a particularly harsh wave nudges his back. “How much of my past did you get to see back there?”

He feels almost manic as Shiro approaches him in the water, like an animal cornered and trapped. Shiro keeps his distance, keeps his hands up when he sees the tense line of Keith’s body.

“Why did you come here?” Keith demands from Shiro again.

“Because you’re-”

“Telling me I’m fascinating won’t cut it, Shirogane,” Keith says snaps, folding his arms over his chest. Shiro looks at him for a moment, face open and concerned like any of this actually means anything. That expression closes into itself fast though; Shiro goes steely-eyed. Even though he’s standing eight feet away from it, Keith can feel the intensity in the way the other man looks at him.

“I have an investment that I need to protect,” Shiro says tersely, digging his hands into his pockets. “An investment that I need to see through.”

Of course. 

Keith stares back at Shiro. Shiro cuts an impressive figure in the water, large and intimidating even against the expanse of the beach behind him. His back has gone straight and he’s tipped his chin up, any hint of familiarity and friendliness gone from his posture. It’s professional on the outside, but Keith recognizes it for what it is. Shiro knows he’s come across something he shouldn’t have, and now he’s an animal on the defensive. 

Keith thinks about what they’ve shared so far. What he’s shown Shiro. Thinks about how he thought Shiro might, just in the slightest bit, be a friend. 

But Keith— Keith understands. 

“None of what you saw will affect my ability to do the job,” he tells Shiro, voice cool. “You don’t have to worry. Marmora was a lifetime ago. The other thing you saw, even longer.”

And it did in fact feel like a lifetime ago that Kolivan had told him to jump ship and leave the country before Altea Corp. could put a bounty on him. By the time Keith’s plane had touched down in Zurich, a national arrest warrant had been issued for him in the States. 

Shiro doesn’t reply, just stands in the lapping waves and watches Keith. Keith runs a hand through his hair as they stand for a prolonged moment. The silence is taut between them like a bow, Shiro with the riser and Keith holding onto the string, leaning back and ready to snap.

He decides to let go.

His suit jacket’s grown uncomfortable so Keith shakes it off, lets it drop in the water. Walks towards Shiro, rolling his sleeves up. Shiro takes his hands out of his pockets, looking unsure as Keith comes to a halt in front of him. A bird flies overhead, screeching into the air, and Keith counts backwards from ten so that it doesn’t swoop down and hit Shiro.

“This idea that you want us to plant in Lotor’s head,” Keith says, squinting at him under the bright sunlight. “This will change who he is.” 

“I know,” Shiro replies, in a voice that’s a lot more earnest than Keith expected. Some of the defensive professionalism that was there has bled out.

“It’ll come to define both him and the company for the rest of his life,” Keith continues, and Shiro tips his head to the side. “The consequences of undoing a legacy like this will stretch on for decades.”

“We are what remains between GALRA Engineering and a total monopoly over the industry,” Shiro says, runs wet hand over his face. He glistens under the sunlight and with his white hair, his scar, his broad shoulders dressed in a sharp suit, Shiro himself looks a little unreal. “Dayak has an iron fist and the first thing she would want to do when Zarkon passes is crush green energy.”

Keith regrets speaking, almost. Wishes the answer didn’t deflate him a little, wishes it was anyone else standing in front of him. He’s long been drawn into Shiro’s orbit and he would be a fool to deny it. But there’s still enough anger in him that he presses his lips together and pushes past Shiro to continue on to the beach. 

Which seems to be even further than it was before. Keith curses internally as he wades through the water, ignoring Shiro’s questions about where he’s going. He tries to concentrate and bring the beach closer to himself but to no avail. Keith hears the water splashing behind him and knows Shiro’s following close behind. 

“I’m not doing this just because I’m power hungry,” Shiro calls out, and somehow he’s drawing closer faster to Keith than Keith is to the beach. Keith turns, heels digging in the wet sand, and shakes his head at Shiro. 

“It’s okay if you are,” Keith says. “You wouldn’t be the first.”

Shiro opens his mouth, but is cut off by a giant, earth-shaking rumble that sends ripples through the water. The ground vibrates underneath them and both of them flail, trying hard not to fall into the water. There’s a loud cracking sound, like something is trying to break through the earth and Keith whips around to see what’s happening. 

All of a sudden, the shaking stops. 

That beach that was so far away is suddenly so painfully close. On it sits a small and run down modular home, faded robin blue paint peeling off the vinyl exterior. Keith’s heart comes to a standstill in his throat and the are around him goes dead.

“Keith?”

Keith can barely hear him. Can barely hear whoever is with him. He stares at the familiar house and feels an overwhelming urge of— nostalgia? Pain? He’s not sure, but he feels another wave of something strong hit him as he looks at the very last gift his parents had left him.

His body moves automatically. Keith doesn’t tread the water as much as he tears through it, feeling some sort of manic haze settle over him. He doesn’t care though, doesn’t even reach for the spinning top in his pocket. Rapidly the water gives way to damp sand and as soon as Keith hits dry land he starts to run, kicking sand up around him. 

“Keith!” Shiro calls out from behind him but Keith’s frenetic in a way he hasn’t felt in a long time. 

He runs and runs and runs. The sand drags under him but his lungs don’t strain, can’t strain. He will keep running till he reaches the house.

Keith stumbles the moment he reaches the rotting wooden steps of the house. He tries to brace himself but his head thwacks against the splintered staircase. Keith tries to get up but something roots him to the steps of the home he had left a lifetime ago. He plants a palm on the stairs and pushes but his ankles feel bound down by weights, like nothing will be able to lift him up. 

The soft strain of a familiar song starts to rise alongside a soft sob in his lungs. Keith tries to drag himself up but it’s hard and it’s far and he’s never going to make it in. Two large hands grab him by the shoulders and haul him up. Only then is he able to rise to his feet as Shiro clutches onto him from behind, trying to steady him.

The music starts to swell and grow louder. Keith turns in Shiro’s arms and tries to shake off his hold. But Shiro’s grip is strong and sure and unrelenting. 

“You were talking in your sleep when I came in,” Shiro says over the music, looking like he’s trying to plead with Keith. “You aren’t supposed to do that under sedation that heavy.”

“Don’t tell the others what you saw,” Keith begs, feeling raw and vulnerable and exposed in a way he’s never been to someone else. “What you saw is a man I’ve been trying to hide, a part of myself I’ve been trying to kill—”

In the distance, there’s a whistle of a train. The last thing Keith sees is Shiro’s stunned face.

* * *

Keith feels like he’s about to float out of his body as he comes to. As his brain de-fogs, Shiro is already sitting up in his chair with an indiscernible look on his face. They’re in the back room of the warehouse where Hunk stores his serum; it had been locked up but Keith’s got the master key and had gotten sloppy. 

He only put himself under because he couldn’t sleep the night before. Keith doesn’t dream anymore but he had been struck by the foolish urge to do so and decided to come to the warehouse before anyone else did.

Keith hasn’t felt this way in a long time and thinks he might have made another one of life’s bigger mistakes, exposing such a large amount of vulnerability to a client of his. Even if the client has been making an attempt to get closer and closer.

Shiro stares at him openly and Keith doesn’t know what to say. He doesn’t know what kind of door he’s opened for Shiro into his own psyche, but he wishes he could slam it shut. Keith can’t even feel frustration at the fact that Shiro intruded into his dream. His entire body feels heavy, the effects of the sedation still ebbing away.

“I came in early and saw the door for Hunk’s lab open,” Shiro says. His voice is dry at the ends. “I heard you talk. I don’t think that’s supposed to happen under sedation that heavy.”

I t’s not. Sedatives aren’t supposed to make you sleep-talk or sleep-walk or the whole business of dream extraction would have long gone under. Not normally, anyways. But Keith’s definitely slipped through the cracks before. Thankfully never on the job, but it always looms over him.

“What was I saying?” Keith asks and Shiro hesitates, pressing his lips together. The bottom of Keith’s stomach has started to sink, and the way Shiro looks at him does not make it any better. It appears for a moment that Shiro is going to be reticent but—

“You were calling for your parents,” Shiro says quietly, and Keith gut drops. “You weren’t yelling or even talking, just whispering, but…”

Shiro doesn’t finish his sentence. Instead, he shifts his gaze to the floor and allows a pregnant pause to stretch over them. Keith exhales through his nose and starts to form an explanation in his mind. If he’s cold and calculated in his execution, then there’s a chance Shiro will still have faith in him. If he doesn’t, then Keith has trained his team well enough that they’ll be able to complete their job on their own. And then when they complete it successfully, he’ll use it as leverage to cash in on Shiro’s promise.

Keith tells himself that it’s not the first time a client’s found out about the reason the Altea job went south. Not the first time he’s had to convince and prove himself to a client. But Keith’s never had a client like Shiro either, one that’s gotten so involved on a personal level. The kind of intimate look Shiro’s had— Keith’s yet to think of a contingency plan for that.

Shiro startles him by speaking first.

“I spoke with Kolivan before we met,” Shiro says, eyes still glued to the floor. Keith’s spine goes rigid at the name. “He holds you in high regard. Before I even had a face to a name, I felt like I knew so much about you.”

“You know about the man he thought I was,” Keith replies, and Shiro looks up at him. “But now you know that’s not who I am-”

“And when I worked with you, I saw why people praised you,” Shiro cuts in before Keith can finish. “I don’t think any less of you. I know what happened in the Altea job and I still think you’re the best man for this one.”

The comment blindsides him. Keith blinks. Normally, something like this would be a kiss of death for a job. Keith’s lost a few contracts because someone found out about Hira right before they started and those who chose to keep him made it well known they were hesitant about doing so.

“Did Kolivan tell you why the Altea job went wrong?” Keith asks cautiously and Shiro furrows his brows.

“Well,” Shiro starts. “He said an interference had killed your mark in the dream.”

“Did he tell you that it was my interference?” Keith says, and Shiro’s jaw snaps. More or less what Keith expected. “Did he tell you that Hira had gotten struck by a train in a courtyard? A train that my subconscious had put in there?”

“Kolivan—”

“Wouldn’t have said that, I know.” Keith says briskly. “It’s a stain on his-”

“—had told me,” Shiro says, voice and words so firm that it takes Keith by surprise. Keith blinks at him, not expecting Shiro to already know that piece of information. “Kolivan has already told me that you have ghosts that haunt you in every dream.”

Kolivan does not trust easy. Keith wonders what part of his charm and earnestness Shiro turned on to get that kind of information from his notoriously tight-lipped mentor. Kolican does not give in to money so to have heard anything of this sort from Kolivan, to even get him to have a conversation…

Keith looks at Shiro. Wonders what kind of man he is and what he did to earn that kind of trust from Kolivan.

“They’re not ghosts,” Keith says tentatively. The word feels uncomfortable rolling around in his mouth because it’s not quite true. “They’re just shades of people I used to know. People I love.”

In the far distance, there’s the sound of a car pulling into the small lot beside the warehouse. Shiro frowns at the sound and stands up, brushing off the front of his pants. He turns to look at the door, but they can’t hear anyone enter the warehouse. When Shiro reverts his gaze back to Keith, he looks contemplative.

“I see a lot of who I wanted to be in you,” Shiro murmurs, like he’s talking to himself. “In another life, maybe.”

“What?” Keith can’t help it. “A promising extractor who ends up becoming an exiled thief?”

Shiro straightens up, narrows his eyes. Gazes down at Keith in a way that pins.

“Yes,” Shiro throws back and it’s easy to feel the bite in the words. “That’s exactly who I wanted to be.”

Keith remembers the tall apartment building in Shiro’s dream, the one with the lone light on. That kind of dream is something Lance and Allura would both call a symbol of an extremely lonely childhood. Something that Keith’s all too familiar with. But Keith’s long known that that kind of past is not necessarily something you can forge a bond on.

“I can do the job,” Keith says, and Shiro turns on his heel to bodily face Keith. He takes a step forward and Keith has to tilt his head back to look up at Shiro. Keith doesn’t really have more as part of his sales pitch; he just wants to move on.

“I know,” Shiro’s voice is less acerbic as he looks down on Keith. “But you don’t like this imbalance of vulnerability between, do you?” 

“You’re the boss,” Keith shrugs as nonchalantly as he can, as if Shiro hasn’t pinpointed him. “At the end of the day, my job is to make sure Lotor does what you need him to do.”

“I need you to trust me,” Shiro replies. “I want to balance us out, Keith.”

Something about those words stokes something greedy in Keith, and he too narrows his eyes. He thinks his dream was heavy and his emotions are still swirling and haven’t quite settled it. So this hint of an offer, this idea that Shiro thinks he has something equivalent to what he witnessed; Keith wants it. Wants that balance.

“What are you going to give me?” Keith asks, the words familiar. Shiro visibly pauses before answering. 

“I can show you something,” Shiro says. He holds out his hand towards Keith like a gesture of good will. “Not a lot of people know about it. Not a lot of people are allowed to.”

Keith doesn’t take Shiro’s hand. He looks down at it instead, gives a fleeting glance to the palm and the long fingers before he looks back at Shiro. Shiro nods, and Keith’s about to reach out and shake it—

There’s a loud bang as the front door to the warehouse is thrown open. Keith immediately jumps to his feet, fully alert, and exchanges a quick look of surprise with Shiro before he hears Allura’s voice.

“Keith?” she calls, and Keith pushes past Shiro and out of Hunk’s working station. “Keith, we have to move. Now.”

“What happened?” he asks, and he sees Hunk trailing behind her, three steel briefcases in hand. There’s another set of screeching tires outside and the sound of a door slamming. Keith can hear Lance yell something out to Pidge, and Allura tosses a thick dark coat towards him.

“It’s go time,” Allura replies, and Keith feels a flat weight in the pocket of a coat. “Lotor’s flying to Los Angeles in two hours. He’s got a funeral to attend.”

The flat weight is Keith’s passport, the one with his real name. Not the one he’s been using to hop around the continent. “Whose?”

Allura has a sharp look in her eye, one that Keith knows all too well from having seen her on the precipice of danger many times.

“His father’s. Starting tomorrow, Lotor has officially inherited GALRA Engineering.”

* * *

They move fast. Within an hour of Allura coming in with the news, Keith is staring out of the wall to wall window of the airport terminal, watching as a crew loads passenger luggage into a 747. 

“If I get on this plane and you don’t honour our agreement, I’m a dead man as soon as I touch American soil,” Keith says as he stares out into the tarmac. Shiro’s said he’s pulled his strings in advance but a man that powerful can cut them as easily. 

With how quickly they’ve had to hustle, they haven’t been able to return to their previous conversation. Keith doesn’t know if they can or if the door is still open.

“Complete the job en route and I’ll only need to make one call,” Shiro replies from beside him. They have around five minutes left till the gate attendants start calling boarding. “You’ll have no trouble getting through immigration.” 

Keith has no doubt about it. With all his cool professionalism, Shiro had arranged cars within five minutes to take them to the airport, making sure the entire first class cabin was theirs. He barely had to bat an eyelash to get one of Allura’s associates onto the flight as an attendant, barely had to lift a finger to get them to go through the security checks. Briefcases full of sedative and serum were already on the plane by the time they reached the boarding gates, waiting to get called.

Keith wants to ask Shiro, badly. Wants to ask him what he was going to show Keith, if the scope of being shown it still remains. Keith wants to know what Shiro wanted to show him to level out the playing field. But the intercom overhead crackles and Keith doubts he’ll get a chance again.

As open as he seemed to want to be with Keith earlier on, Keith would hate to think what Shiro could do if this job went wrong.

The set up goes smoothly. Hunk and Allura are the first to board, playing the role of an excited couple on a honeymoon. Lance bumps into Lotor as they board first class and swipes his passport, passing it off to Keith as they sit down. The tall blonde attendant, Romelle, closes off the curtains in the cabin from any prying eyes as soon as Pidge saunters in last and Shiro takes his place across the aisle from Keith. Keith’s seated right behind Lotor, who looks distant as he pushes his briefcase into the overhead cabin.

Lotor is tall but not imposing; it’s clear from the way that he holds himself that he’s only upright on principle. The large figure that’s cast a shadow over him his entire life has died and Keith knows they need to move quick to fill that void before Dayak or anyone else does. There’s some sort of sorrow set in Lotor’s shoulders and Keith thinks it’s not entirely due to his father’s death.

In the takeoff Keith’s gut rises to his throat as he feels the nervousness build. He’s not even attempted to head back in the years he’s been exiled out of fear of whether immigration or Altea Corp. would get to him first. Keith’s fate lies in whether or not he can complete a near-impossible task and when the seatbelt signs beeps off, he has to wipe his palms on his pants before he begins.

“Excuse me,” Keith leans over and taps Lotor on the shoulder. “I think this might be yours.”

“Oh,” Lotor frowns down at the passport Keith holds out. He blinks at it, and shakes his head.“Sorry about that, thank you.”

“Don’t mention it,” Keith responds. “By the way, I couldn’t help but notice…”

He asks Lotor if his father happens to be the head of  _ that _ energy conglomerate. Lotor gives a brief nod and tells Keith he is his father. Was his father. As Keith gives him his condolences and tells him his father was a very inspiring figure, Lotor’s shoulders grow rigid and he looks out of the window of his seat.

When Romelle asks if they would like drinks, Lotor’s voice comes out tight as he asks for water. He looks out the window as he waits which gives Keith plenty of time to empty out a small vial of the sedative into his water. Keith grabs the glass and passes it to Lotor, and raises his own glass of water.

“To your father,” Keith says and Lotor hesitates before he gingerly clinks the crystal against Keith’s. “May he rest in peace, yeah?”

It only takes a minute before Lotor is out like a light. Keith double checks, shoving the man’s shoulder to see if he reacts, but Lotor is stiller than the dead. Keith looks up to see his whole team staring at him. He nods and they immediately spring into action.

Romelle brings two silver briefcases to the cabin and everyone gets to work wiring themselves up for the sedative and the dream serum. The serum is administered through multiple tubes coming out of one drip in the briefcase and Keith takes the utmost care in putting the needle for Lotor’s into his wrist. He can’t afford his mark waking up with mysterious bruising, especially if Lotor has even the most minimal awareness of dream thieves.

Glasses of champagne are passed around, but Keith opts to stick with his water. He does a quick check to make sure everyone’s hooked up before he slides into his own seat. The needle barely stings as he relaxes his wrist, and Keith inhales deeply through his nose. He looks over to see Shiro, who gives him a small nod. In the distance, Hunk gives Romelle the go-ahead and she presses one of the switches. 

Keith wakes up at the wheel of a car, sitting at the stoplight of a busy intersection. The rain outside is torrential and through the sheets of water pouring down, he sees Hunk standing right past the lights, looking out for them. He honks his horn as he pulls up, and Hunk looks wet and miserable.

“Couldn’t have peed before you went under?” Allura asks as Hunk slides in and he gives her an apologetic look.

“Too much free champagne, right?” Lance says amusedly and Hunk shoots  _ him _ a dirty look. Shiro snorts from where he’s sitting beside Allura in the back. 

“Shut up,” Hunk grunts. “At least we know he’ll be looking for a taxi in this weather. I did you a favour.”

They find a bright yellow cab to trail and Keith pushes the accelerator enough to bump up against the rear of the cab without crunching his own hood. Predictably, the taxi driver screeches to a halt and steps out of the cab, extremely angry.

“Hey asshole!” the driver calls out as he slams the door shut and walks towards Keith. Keith rolls down the window as he approaches and reaches for the holster under his jacket. “Why don’t you go f-”

“Walk away,” Keith says briskly, pulling out his Beretta. He makes a shoo’ing motion with the gun and the wide-eyed driver throws his hands up before turning around and hightailing it. Allura and Shiro jump into the taxi, Allura taking the driver’s side while Shiro slides all the way down in the front passenger seat, hiding himself from view. 

It doesn’t take long to find Lotor standing on a street, yelling over the rain into his phone with one hand and trying to flag down a cab with the other. Lance immediately gets out of the car and slides into the taxi as Lotor does and Keith watches the shadows from behind. He sees a slight scuffle and sees Shiro rise up out of the passenger seat, training a gun on Lotor. Keith watches Lotor slump back against the passenger seat as they pull out onto the road and grips his steering wheel. They head towards their location, a burned out version of their warehouse, and it goes according to plan.

Till it doesn’t.

It’s probably because he had been rattled so recently. Or maybe it’s because the dream he shared with Shiro is still fresh in his brain. But either ways Keith knows there’s no actual excuse for a train to rumble through the intersection, the lumbering giant crushing cars as it goes. It happens right after he scoops up Pidge and they stare wide-eyed at the giant locomotive blaring through the city streets. She asks what the hell is happening but the question is soon lost because they find out just exactly how prepared Lotor is.

Whoever’s trained Lotor in defending himself from any sort of infiltration must be a military-grade dream extractor. It’s the only way to describe the sheer amount of violence Keith and his team drive in to as they try to reverse and go through a different route. Three large SUVs pull up ahead of him and try to box the cab in on the street. Doors open up to allow armed men to pour out and find who exactly has kidnapped their master. Keith sees Allura accelerate  _ hard _ , hitting one of the gunmen as another puts a bullet through the cab window, shattering it.

Keith slams his foot down on the pedal, yells at Pidge and Hunk to get down as the gunmen try to pump metal into his car too. It’s only by a small grace that they’re successfully able to ram their cars into the gunmen before the team screeches into another alleyway, Hunk working hard to build some sort of short cut that blocks off any more armed guards ambushing them. They manage to pull their wrecked cars into the warehouse, and Allura looks scrambled as she jumps out of the cab.

“What the hell was the train doing there?” she yells at Hunk, and he just gives a helpless shrug. She shoots a sharp look to Keith but Keith’s already busy hauling Lotor out of the back of the cab. Lance has thrown a burlap sack over his head and Keith hands him off to Pidge and Hunk, instructing them to throw Lotor in the back room. 

“What the hell were those guards doing there?” Keith demands back, feeling a little incensed. He’s not encountered military-grade defenses in a civilian and it’s thrown him for a loop. The quickness with which those guards descended on them is beyond even what the private security sector teaches it’s clients. Even when Shiro had found him out, his guards were not that vicious. “That’s not the kind of violence we were prepared for.”

“It didn’t show in the research where he was trained or who trained,” Allura snaps back and Keith’s about to open his mouth again when she hauls a second person out of the car.

Keith heart drops as he sees Shiro’s limp body get dragged out and eased onto the ground. There’s an unmistakable red splotch, large and growing on the front of his suit as Shiro groans and clutches his chest in pain. Keith goes wide-eyed as he drops to his knees but Shiro doesn’t notice, his teeth gritted and eyes scrunched shut.

“What the hell happened to him?” Keith’s voice almost cracks with how hard he yells this time, and he tries to grab at Shiro’s face. Allura smacks his hands away and grabs Keith by the shoulders, pulling both of them up as Shiro curls on the ground. 

“We’ve dealt with sub-security before,” Allura says firmly, but there’s some heat swirling in her voice as well. She’s as prone to her temper as Keith is and Keith knows they’re both reaching an explosive point. “We’ll be fine.”

“This was  _ not _ part of the plan— hey!” Keith sees Lance approaching, cocking a pistol and pointing it towards Shiro’s head.

“I’m going to put him out of his misery,” Lance says but Keith grabs his wrist and uses the leverage to slam Lance against the door of the cab. “Holy shit, calm down!”

“What the fuck are you doing?” Keith’s almost feverish now with how south things are going, Shiro bleeding out onto the ground. Lance throws his hands up and looks at Keith likes he’s crazy.

“I’m waking him up,” Lance says incredulously, “Unless you want him to remain there in agony while we go take a nap.”

_ Shit _ .

“No,” Keith says, letting go of Lance and rubbing his hand down his face. “No, we can’t kill him. It won’t wake him up.”

The room around him comes to a standstill. Lance narrows his eyes. “What do you mean it won’t wake him up?”

“No it won’t-”

“When we die in a dream, we wake up,” Lance says firmly and Hunk cuts in.

“Not from this,” he says, looking back and forth between Lance and Keith. “We’re too heavily sedated for that to wake up that way.”

It’s his fault. Keith knows this. He should have told his team earlier, should not have told Hunk to hold onto the secret till Keith shared it with the team. Should have been less selfish.

But they wouldn’t have agreed to it otherwise. The risk is too large, the margin of error too wide, especially with a mark that’s got defenses as brutal as Lotor’s. The job itself is precarious and the circumstances are making it moreso. 

“Keith,” Lance pushes off the car, and starts to crowd in on Keith. He looks furious and Keith knows that if he looks around, his team will look the same. “What happens if we die in this dream, Keith?”

There’s some guilt that starts to bubble in him but Keith’s determined to see this through.All he wants to do is go home.

“We drop into limbo,” he says, and braces.

  
  
  



	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **IMPORTANT: I've updated the tags on this fic as I realized not everyone would be familiar with Inception/have those built in warnings, so please check the tags!

Keith’s parents hadn’t actually been as cruel as they are in Keith’s dreams. Keith wishes they had been. It would make everything so much easier, would maybe fractionally ease the guilt.

(It wouldn’t— Keith knows that too.)

He hasn’t told Allura this but the concept of inception is more than a familiar friend to Keith. Keith hasn’t told anyone this save for hinting it to Kolivan, who used it as a reason to pull him in as one of Marmora’s youngest recruits, right after he flunked out of basic in San Diego.

Kolivan had known his mother well and had found Keith living on the edge of a small town in the guest house on his parents’ old ranch. The main bungalow remained abandoned, the soft blue paint peeling off as ghosts swirled within it. For years Keith had refused to open the door. But then he was kicked out of the country. Now, he’d kill for the chance.

Yet even Kolivan does not know the full story. Keith had made it seem like he was a misguided kid trying to save his parents. And he was, maybe. But there had been a childlike selfishness in what he had done that has haunted him for years.

Keith’s mother was an extractor and his father made serums. Together, they had built a life.

Together, they had built multiple lives.

Keith didn’t know much about the dream world as a child and had only started to learn as a teenager. But he’s a line of gasoline right before the match drops and once he takes an interest in something, curiosity will burn through him violently.

He hadn’t meant to intrude but he was fourteen and inquisitive and had found his parents sleeping in longer than normal one day. He had missed his bus and, wanting a ride to school, knocked on his parent’s door. They had not been on their bed but on the floor of their room, side by side like they were laying in coffins. That morning, Keith learned how to administer the serum to himself.

On the first level of the dream, he had been killed instantly by accidentally stepping onto a train track. When Keith had finally woken up in his parent’s dream, they looked thirty years older. They were more than happy to see him— they thought he was part of the dream. They had already built a version of him, but that version had grown up and left.

With Keith appearing again, his parents thought that they had restarted. So they de-aged themselves in the dream. But this had terrified Keith; knowing they raised a maquette of him in their dreams unsettled him deeply. He did not know how to wake himself up either, not from here.

Keith never let them on to his true nature, but he had thought that his parents had been trapped here and that they needed to wake up. That they needed to take care of their real son. That Keith had noticed how they had been increasingly sending him to stay with relatives and friends over random days in the week, only for him to come home to them fast asleep. That he noticed that they were distracted when they were awake.

Eventually, he had managed to convince them. Managed to plant the seed that their world was not the real one, that they had duties to complete. His mother had been the first to believe him. His father shortly followed. It led to all three of them holding hands on the edge of a steep cliff, Keith feeling a brief moment of victory.

It was immediately apparent when they woke up that something was wrong with Keith’s parents. It was implacable but Keith had known. His parents had been surprised to see him, but they hadn’t yelled at him. His father had looked mournful while his mother hugged him, bringing him close while her eyes were vacant. Keith wishes they actually had yelled at him.

Keith was fourteen, so he didn’t understand what kind of depth he had pulled them from till the effects of it started to creep into their real lives. To throw them back into the existing world after a lifetime of dreaming had taken a toll on his parents.

They looked at each other different. His mother grew more hollow, still loved Keith but always sounded like she was looking for something. Hoping for something. His father had unfortunately, had taken it worse. 

Slowly, Keith’s father was convinced that the world he existed in was a dream, just like Keith had convinced him when they were all in a dream. That Krolia and Keith were waiting for him in the real world. That the only solution was to try and wake himself up and leave behind a plethora of evidence implicating Krolia if she decided not to join him.

Krolia had to flee to not get pinned for the murder. By the time she had cleaned her record and come back to California, Keith had already been exiled. And he hasn’t had a chance to help her recover. Hasn’t had a chance to apologize. But he’s burdened himself with the blame— if he had just shut the door, walked away.

He has no idea what his mother thinks of him now, if she thinks of him. When she had fled, she had been a shell. Keith wonders how much of his parents would have been left if he had just let them live out the dream till the serum ran out.

The only one who knows even a fragment of any of this is Kolivan, and Keith wonders if Kolivan has told Shiro. Kolivan is imperceptible and a safeguard of secrets so Keith doubts it. But then he almost wishes Kolivan had. Because then, Shiro would have never given him the job.

And Shiro would never have been lying on top of a steel table, bleeding out as Allura looked at Keith with urgency for what to do next.

His team’s trust has been broken. Keith can glean that much from the way they’ve been looking at him. But they’ll follow him anyways; at this point, they no longer have a choice. Pidge isn’t speaking to him right now, while Lance and Hunk keep giving him furtive glances.

In part, he can thank Allura. She kicked him out of the room to have a hushed conversation with the others, leaving him sitting with an unconscious Shiro. Shiro has been growing paler by the moment, a startling detail given that they’re in a dream. His forehead had been burning up and the guilt that chewed at Keith as he watched over him was no small thing.

When he was allowed back in, Allura had made the executive decision to chug along. Lotor’s projections move in quick but they’re quicker. Allura and Lance step out and Keith can hear the steady, muffled gunfire as they clear the way.

They pile into a white van, Hunk at the wheel as they tear out of the warehouse. Allura and Lance return, sort of ruffled but Keith thinks they’ve been able to bleed out some of their tension. Shiro’s in the van too, sitting to Keith’s left. Lotor’s on his right, tied up and silent, burlap sack over his head.

They had interrogated Lotor briefly, had worn ski masks and had shoved a phone in his face and told him that two of Keith’s men were sitting in front of the private vault in his home in London, waiting for the combination. Lotor had refused to tell them anything until they shoved Lance into the room. He had taken the form of Dayak, impressively so, right down to her mannerisms as he sternly told Lotor he was not to cave. Allura cracked the butt of her pistol against Lance-as-Dayak’s face, almost knocking him out.

Lotor had sputtered and floundered and spat out a random set of numbers, a  _ 117-987.  _ Keith told him he had to do better, and threw the sack over his head.

It takes no time for Lotor’s projections to catch up with them. As soon as they pull out of the lot of the warehouse, three armored SUVs come barrelling towards them. Hunk’s a good getaway driver but the projections are wicked. The van lurches and swings around corners and Keith swears while he props up Shiro and tries to make sure he doesn’t get too jostled.

It’s going to be a long ride, but they need to get to work.

“His security is going to get worse,” Allura says, nodding out the window. She’s sitting shotgun, while Lance and Pidge occupy the middle seats. “Piled on with whatever turbulence we have while flying, the dreams are going to get a lot more unstable the further down you go.”

“We’re going to run Mr. Griffin,” Keith says and before he can say anything, an unmistakable  _ fuck you _ leaves Allura’s lips. Keith continues, even as she makes a noise of an objection. “The second we approach Lotor, his security is going to catch up. We do what we did on the Olkari job.”

“Oh, so you’ve done it before?” Lance asks. At the same time, Pidge also says, “What the hell is Mr.Griffin?”

“We’ve tried it but it didn’t work,” Allura says, turning to glare at Keith. “The subject realized he was dreaming and his subconscious tore us to pieces.”

“But it was a learning experience, right?” Lance says dryly and Allura rolls her eyes. She gives Keith another look but Keith shakes his head; their timeline has been cut down by more than half.

“We’ll need a distraction,” Keith says, and there’s a soft groan from beside him. Shiro’s eyes open just a sliver and he lurches forward, mumbling something. Keith presses a flat palm against a broad chest, shushing him, and brushes his sweat-plastered bangs off his forehead.

“No problem,” Lance watches Keith while Pidge pulls out the suitcase full of serum. “How about a lovely lady I’ve used before?”

Keith nods and takes the needles from Pidge. He slides one into Lotor’s hand first and feels Lotor wince under him. He pays it no mind, dropping some of the sleep serum over the burlap sack till Lotor goes limp. Shiro’s next, and Keith takes care in rolling up the sleeve of his dirty suit and inserting the needle into the straightest vein on his forearm.

He had been debating whether or not to bring Shiro down another level but Keith figures he can keep a better eye on him this way. He’ll also be able to gauge how much life Shiro has left in him in this dream, how much time he has before he slips into limbo.

“We need to shift his animosity from his father to his godmother,” Keith says, looking over his shoulder as they continue to get chased. He ducks as he hears a pop but thankfully, no bullet shatters the glass.

“You’re going to destroy his one positive relationship?” Pidge asks incredulously.

“No,” Lance says as he shucks off his jacket, some pep back in his voice. “We’re going to repair his relationship with his father while exposing the  _ true _ nature of his godmother. We should honestly charge Lotor a lot more for this job than Shirogane. The stronger his issues are, the more cathartic this ride will be.”

“You drive careful, ok?” Keith tells Hunk and Hunk snorts. “Everything is going to be rocky as hell down there.”

“As careful as I can in a car chase,” Hunk replies, and Allura reaches over to pat his shoulder, right as he takes another sharp curve.

“Don’t jump to soon,” Allura warns as everyone settles back into their seats, ready to sleep. “And don’t forget to play your music.”

“Yes mum,” Hunk replies. “Everyone ready?”

“Ready!” Allura calls, and Lance and Pidge exchange props before they close their eyes. The last thing Keith hears is Hunk wishing them sweet dreams, and he falls asleep too fast to think of a comeback.

* * *

  
  
Keith rolls his head, neck creaking with the action. He adjusts the cuffs on his charcoal-grey suit as he walks down the large marble atrium towards the gilded archway of the hotel bar. 

Allura and Pidge are sitting on a bench a few feet away, observing their surroundings. Keith sees Shiro in the far distance, heading towards the elevator, striding with so much purpose that no one would guess he had gotten shot.

Lotor is sitting at the bar, lips tugged downwards. He’s clearly not enjoying the company of the dark-haired woman leaning against the counter beside him. She’s dressed in a midnight-blue dress that reflects a deep purple when she shifts, and she moves with uncharacteristic elegance.

“Am I boring you?” she asks Lotor, and Keith watches as Lotor takes a pointed sip of his drink. Keith straightens his collar and makes his way towards his mark.

“Lotor!” Keith calls out, throwing his hands out in a genial gesture while he grins widely. The woman looks at him and breaks character, rolling her eyes with the most Lance-like expression before she settles into looking bored again.

“Matt from head of marketing,” Keith holds out his hand and Lotor simply stares at it. Keith lets it linger before he turns to the woman and asks, “You are?”

“Leaving,” she replies curtly. The woman pulls a gold pen out from a smallblack purse and tugs a napkin towards herself. She jots down her number in Lance’s characteristically ugly handwriting, a crisp  _ 117-987 _ , and pushes it towards Lotor with a sly look.

“In case you need a little more excitement,” she says with a smirk before she saunters off, gliding across the bar and disappearing into the atrium. Lotor watches her for a moment, and Keith clears his throat.

“I wouldn’t count on it too much,” Keith says easily, tipping his chin towards the napkin. “Not unless her number actually is six-digits long.”

Lotor raises an eyebrow at Keith before looking down at the napkin.

“Interesting proposition from a woman who stole your wallet,” Keith’s voice is conversational as he continues. Lotors eyes widen and he pats his jacket, swearing under his breath when he discovers Keith’s telling the truth.

“Motherf-” Lotor starts, sighs. “That wallet alone is worth at least—”

“Five hundred dollars, right?” Keith says and Lotor pauses. “Don’t worry about it. My people are already on it as we speak.”

The glass of whiskey Lotor had been nursing rattles gently against the bar top. Lotor puts a finger on it to stop it and Keith tenses, knowing Hunk’s probably still on the run from Lotor’s security. He hates to think what they’ll face down here.

“Sorry,” Lotor turns to Keith, suspicion all over his face. The bartender has been cursorily rubbing down the same spot three feet away from them for the past few minutes. “Who did you say you were?”

“I’m your head of marketing,” Keith says and takes the opportunity to pull out the bar stool beside Lotor. “But you and I know that’s not true, yeah? Do you remember me?”

The blank look Lotor gives him as he sits down tells Keith all he needs to know.

“I’m your head of security down here,” Keith leans in, lowering his voice. “My name is Mr. Griffin.”

Keith can practically hear Allura’s eyes roll, no matter the fact that she’s sitting over a hundred feet away. He channels as much cool and confidence as he can into his movements; it’s the only way this will work.

“Hotel security?” Lotor asks and Keith shakes his head.

“No,” Keith replies. “The security for your subconscious.”

“Pardon?” Lotor raises one manicured eyebrow and there’s a moment where Keith hesitates. Remembers that Shiro’s bleeding out in the backseat of a van. There’s a small shattering sound behind them, the bartender having dropped a glass flute onto the counter as they stare at Keith and Lotor. Keith clears his throat.

“I’m here to protect you,” Keith says and presses his lips into a thin line. “You’re not safe here. There are people right now who are currently trying to come for you.”

Lotor looks like he thinks Keith’s full of shit so Keith tips his chin towards the giant window behind the bar. A huge swathe of rain spatters against it as the wine bottles on the shelves rattle.

“Strange weather, isn’t it?” Keith says while the counter starts to tremble. Hunk must be having one hell of a time driving because the vibration gets louder and louder. “Pay attention to what’s around you. Notice the shift in gravity.”

Lotor’s drink starts to shift within his glass, the liquid tilting in the crystal like it’s trying to defy physics. Keith points up to the ceiling and Lotor follows, watches the chandeliers lean to one side, pushed by an invisible hand.

Lotor looks visibly uncomfortable, gulping as he looks back at Keith.

“You’re in a dream, Lotor.”

Immediately, the conversational din in the bar ceases along with the rumbling sound. Each and every single projection of Lotor’s subconscious stops what they’re doing to turn and stare at Keith. It’s unnerving to say the least, but Keith soldiers on.

“The easiest way to test yourself is to try and remember how you got to this hotel,” Keith’s voice is a lot more calm and steady than he feels. “Are you able to do that?”

“Yes, I…” Lotor starts, trails off as his voice grows unsure. “I… I came with...uh-”

“Breathe,” Keith soothes, hides his hand in one of his jacket pockets to cover the tremble. “Breathe, remember our training.”

Lotor’s face remains stoic but Keith sees his adam’s apple bob. The knuckles around Lotor’s glass have gone white and there’s a soft  _ cracking _ sound.

“You’re not real?” Lotor finally says with a small voice, and Keith nods. The conversation in the bar resumes, and Keith deflates.

‘I’m a projection of yours,” Keith replies. “A manifestation of your training and your subconscious. I’ve been sent here to protect you in the event that extractors try to pull you into a dream.”

Keith leans in and places a hand on Lotor’s arm. Lotor doesn’t flinch and Keith becomes acutely aware of a grey suit that’s taken a seat three stools over. “That’s what I think is happening to you right now.”

Lotor quickly glances in the direction Keith’s looking and turns back with wide eyes when he sees the man in the suit.

“Okay,” Lotor says. “Okay. Can you get me out of here?”

Keith tries not to look too relieved as he hauls the two of them up. They exit the bar quickly and sure enough, Lotor’s subconscious is on them in less than thirty seconds. Keith shoves them into a bathroom but the men follow them. One shoves him out of the way while heading towards Lotor. Keith grabs him by the collar and kicks his knees out before swiping the gun tucked into the guard’s waistband. 

Keith shoots the guard and turns the gun on the other one.

“What the fuck?” Lotor yells as Keith brings down that guard as well. Keith replies steadily, “These men are sent to abduct you.”

As a peace offering and to further sell himself, Keith picks up a gun from the other guard he shot. He hands it to Lotor. “I need you to work with me. We need to make sure they don’t get you.”

Lotor takes the gun and Keith rolls over the body, patting it down to see if there’s anything of use on it. Keith hears a sharp intake of breath and looks up to see Lotor pointing the gun to his own head.

Keith freezes.

“This should wake me up, right?” Lotor says frantically. “If I wake myself up, I don’t have to bother with this.”

“No!” Keith practically barks out, resisting lunging out for the gun and startling Lotor. “No, you can’t. Not here. We have reason to believe that killing yourself won’t wake you up.”

“What?” Lotor blinks. “What will happen then?”

“You fall into an even deeper sleep,” Keith says, holding out his hand. “One where you won’t wake up from for years.”

Lotor looks like he doesn’t quite believe Keith again, and Keith breathes through his nose.

“Remember what I said to you,” Keith says evenly, trying not to shake. “Remember your training. Give me your gun.”

There’s a brief moment where Keith thinks Lotor’s going to go rogue and the entire mission is going to go to shit. Lotor looks like a trapped cat, too terrified to move.

Finally, he relinquishes the gun to Keith and Keith heaves an inner sigh of relief.

“What do you remember?” Keith asks Lotor, and Lotor frowns. “From when you were awake?”

“There was a lot of rain and…” Something dawns on Lotor’s face and his eyes widen. “Shit. They kidnapped us. Me and Aunt Dayak they— these people have us in the back of a van. I can’t remember their faces.”

“That would explain the gravity shift,” Keith finally gets up to his feet, brushing off the pants of his suit. “I need you to focus and tell me if you remember what they had wanted from you.”

Lotor scrunches his brow, thinks for a moment.

“Something about a safe,” Lotor murmurs. “They kept asking me for the combination of my private safe, but I don’t keep one on my London property. I had no idea what they were talking about.”

“Think,” Keith encourages him on, talks a little quicker to get Lotor’s nerves going. “Think, there must have been a reason they kidnapped you. There must be a reason they wanted that combination.”

“I don’t know,” Lotor wrings his hands, looks at Keith desperately. “I just threw out random numbers, I honestly could not tell what they wanted from me.”

“Sounds like they were trying to extract numbers from your subconscious,” Keith replies, tucks the gun he’s holding into his waistband. “Do you remember what those numbers were?”

“No?” Lotor looks lost, bites his lip. “I don’t know. Shit, uh, nine...eight...seven?”

“Good enough,” Keith responds, glad that Lance’s number had worked. “Let’s go.”

Of course, they already know what numbers Lotor was going to spit out. As they exit the bathroom, Allura and Pidge approach from a distance. Lotor tenses up but Keith nods at them, telling them that they need to go to room 987. 

Lance and Shiro have been tasked with keeping Lotor’s projections at bay, so it’s a smooth but tense journey up the stairs to the ninth floor. When they reach the hotel room, Pidge and Lotor step back while Allura and Keith draw out their guns.

Allura kicks open the hotel room door, and the two of them make a big show of searching around the room. From the closet, Allura finds a silver hardshell briefcase and throws it onto the bed. Keith pops it open, revealing vials and tubes and piping that has Lotor’s eyes going wide.

Right on cue, the door knob for the hotel room turns. Keith gestures to Allura and hides behind the door while Allura presses herself against the wall on the other side, both with their guns drawn.

Dayak opens the door and immediately, Allura grabs her arm and twists it, bringing her down to her knees while Lotor calls out her name. Dayak looks startled to see Lotor before her eyes drop down, sad.

“You said that you were kidnapped together?” Keith asks, grabbing the key card from Lotor’s projection of Dayak.

“W-well not exactly,” Lotor replies, unsure. “They already had her when I was brought in. They were torturing her.”

Keith carefully raises an eyebrow and says with grave intonation, “And you saw them torture her,” knowing well that in the warehouse Lotor had only heard her yelling from another room. 

Lotor squints, shakes his head. Keith remains silent and lets the scene play out. The pause. The wait. The way Dayak won’t quite make eye contact with Lotor again.

And the realization that dawns across Lotor’s face. Everything else that falls into space. 

“The kidnapping...you?” Lotor sounds young when he pleads with Dayak, naive. When he finds out that she is after an alternate will in his father’s safe, one that Keith heavily implies might work in her favour. 

“GALRA Engineering is my whole life,” Dayak says solemnly. “I can’t let you throw it away.”

“Throw away my inheritance?” Lotor says incredulously and Dayak exhales through her nose. “Why would I do that?”

“I can’t let you rise to your father’s last taunt, Lotor,” Dayak says, and she finally looks up at him. “That you couldn’t build what he did. That you couldn’t be your own man. That—”

“That I was a disappointment?” There’s bitterness to Lotor’s voice and he doesn’t notice as Lance and Shiro slip into the hotel room behind Dayak. Keith nods at them and notices a small spattering of blood on Shiro’s shirt. There’s a trickle down his lip but he walks upright towards the back of the room like nothing’s wrong, sharing only a passing glance with Keith.

“He’s wrong though,” Dayak replies softly. “You could build a better company than he ever could.”

That’s the first money shot, and relief briefly flashes across Allura’s face. Keith steps in front of Lotor, blocking his view of Dayak as Pidge and Allura haul her up.

“She’s lying,” Keith says and Lotor tries to protest but he cuts him off. “Trust me Lotor. It’s what I do.”

“The only way we’ll know for sure is if we hop into her dream,” Allura says. They’re actually going to be going into Lotor’s— Lotor is going to help them break into his own subconscious. 

It’s not going to be served to them on a silver platter; his subconscious will be brutal, and the consequences of failing are unfathomable. But they’ve come this far and when Lotor nods and voluntarily decides to go to sleep, Keith knows they will make sure they see it all the way through.

Yet, feels uneasy with the look Allura gives him right before she puts them all under.

  
  


* * *

  
  


Even when the stakes are high. there is something to be said about being able to lucidly experience a dream world. Especially one built by an architect with as much skill and raw talent as Pidge.

The remaining five of them stand on top of a large snow plain in between vast, beautiful mountains. The sun hangs high in the grey sky and the scenery stretches around them, basked in the white-glow, almost alien-like.

There’s a base nestled further ahead and Lotor’s security lies in between the pines surrounding it, waiting to take them out. Lance has taken security duty and has bound off on his skis, ready to distract them with a cat-and-mouse chase. Shiro has volunteered to guide Lotor to the main military base that’s nestled within the mountains. Keith wants to go down with him too, so badly. He tries to not look affected by the way that Shiro casually coughs up blood as he speaks.

But he can’t know the route for this dream. Not in such a critical moment. So he brings Pidge with him to keep point as they all split up. Pidge and Keith find some shrubbery to hide behind and Keith pulls out a rifle from his duffle bag, one that’s as white as their snow suits. He needs to have his team’s backs somehow.

In the distance, Lance shoots a flare gun into the air. The alarm at the military base goes off and an array of tanks and men on snowmobiles tear out, kicking up snow as they look for the source. In the meanwhile, Lotor and Shiro sneak around the trees, evading any detection as they make their way to the building. Pidge keeps a running commentary on what their friends are doing and Keith keeps a tense finger on the trigger.

And the time— it’s ticking. Because shit goes sideways  _ fast _ .

At first, it sounds like it’s the wind. A faint whisper that could be mistaken as the result of an adrenaline rush. Something so infinitesimal and then-

“Keith, are you hearing this?” Lance says into the comms and Keith swears.

The unmistakable strains of music grow louder, meaning that the kick is approaching. Pidge stiffens beside him while Shiro and Lotor continue to scale the ridge the base sits upon.

“Isn’t it too soon?” Pidge squeaks and Keith nods slowly.

“Hunk’s ten seconds out, meaning Allura is three minutes out, meaning we have…” Keith trails off and looks at Pidge.

“Sixty minutes,” comes the response, and Keith closes his eyes.

“Can we make that route in sixty minutes? The two of them still seem far out,” he asks and Pidge shakes her head.

“They still need to climb down to the terrace,” Pidge says. “It’s a labyrinth-”

“There must be an access route, right?” Keith interrupts. “Ones that cut through the maze?” Turns on his walkie again and, “Lance!” Keith barks into it.

“Hold on,” Lance replies, and the tinny sound of gunfire crackles behind him. “Can I get back to you, boss? I’m a little busy.”

“We did make an escape route,” Pidge hurries. “An air-duct system.”

“Explain it to Shiro,” Keith shoves his walkie in front of her. She looks blankly at him, and Keith knows she’s thinking about how every step of the way, Keith had given everyone strict orders not to tell him the layout of his dream.

“It’s okay,” Keith says, pursing his lips. “The mission above all.”

And if anything happens, they’ll deal with it. They’re on borrowed time right now, and Keith can’t afford to risk everything just because of his personal demons.

Pidge delivers the the instructions to Shiro and Lotor as Lance works hard to make sure Lotor’s security is still chasing him. Keith watches Shiro through his binoculars, keeping a watchful eye as the music swells.

And then the first kick is delivered. It comes in the form of an avalanche, hurling down like Armageddon through the crevice of two mountains. It won’t reach the base or the ridge where the two are climbing, but through his binoculars Keith sees Shiro recognize it for what it is.

Shiro cuts the belaying rope, sending him and Lotor tumbling slowly down the ridge. Not fast enough to wake. They hit soft snow and roll down as it follows in a cloud behind them, a taste of what’s to come. The avalanche tapers down before it can reach the ridge, but Keith’s heart is still beating wildly.

_ “What the hell was that?”  _ Lance barks into the walkie, and Keith tries to regroup as he replies.

“The first kick,” he says.

_ “We missed it? Keith what- _ ”

“We have a second one,” Keith cuts in briskly. “When Hunk’s van hits the water. Allura hasn’t made her kick either, so we still have an opportunity to ride back up a couple of levels. We need to act fast.”

Much easier said than done. As if Lotor’s subconscious senses a change in plan, his dream security suddenly overshoot Lance. Lance yells and waves as they drive by him in their tanks but they ignore it like he’s not even there. They must sense that their master is approaching.

“Keep distracting them,” Keith says into the walkie-talkie and Lance just grunts in return. To Pidge, he says, “Let’s move.”

Keith tries to keep calm but feels surmounting dread as he and Pidge ski down towards one of the watchtowers near the base. His brain automatically starts to pick up on the design of Pidge’s dream, while Lotor’s henchmen have all been drawn towards the main base. Lance has ditched trying to distract them from afar to beating one projection off a snowmobile and zipping around, shooting a flare gun repeatedly into the air to keep distracting the security.

Keith wastes no time setting up his rifle again in the watchtower, taking down any part of Lotor’s security detail that gets too close to Shiro and Lotor. 

“We’re in,” Lotor says. Keith almost gets distracted seeing Shiro cough through his scope, but Pidge clears her throat and Keith immediately swivels the muzzle to take down another projection.

It was a mistake. Keith realizes that when he trains the gun back towards the observation deck of the main building, where Lotor and Shiro are. A figure in white fatigues drops down from the ceiling, and points a gun towards Lotor.

“Keith?” Pidge says frantically. “Keith, who’s that?”

Keith was a fool to think he could ever escape his demons.

_ She’s not real _ . Keith should not hesitate to pull the trigger. Yet, this projection of his mother beats him to the punch and shoots Lotor.

“Holy _ shit _ ,” Pidge exclaims from beside him, and Krolia looks up immediately, as if she heard them from over a hundred feet away. There’s a soft  _ pop _ and Krolia crumples out of sight, while Lotor’s personnel bursts through the door.

The rest is a blur.

Lance reaches the observatory deck first, clearing out whatever’s left of the security. But it’s too late; Lotor’s light has quickly faded, and he’s just as bad off as Shiro was. He’s completely unconscious and Keith knows he’s merely seconds away from dying in the dream.

And Shiro— Shiro is so pale, covered in slick sweat and breath laboured. The sight of it almost terrifies Keith, and he rushes to Shiro’s side to slap his face and try to get him to wake up.

“Keith…” Shiro’s voice is hoarse, and Keith looks down at him wide-eyed. Lance and Pidge are quickly trying to find out what to do but Keith’s frozen, staring at the dying man in his arms.

“Shiro, you need to hold on,” Keith says. “You need to, you don’t know what’s down there-”

“I might have an idea,” Shiro grins weakly, still trying to convey some of the charm he had before. “Finish the mission, Keith.”

“Lotor-You-” Keith starts, but Shiro raises a hand to weakly pat Keith’s elbow.

“Find me,” Shiro rasps. Closes his eyes. Exhales loudly through his nose. “I’ll be a lot closer than you think.”

“Stay awake,” Keith tries to fight the lump rising in his throat, shakes Shiro a little, just enough for his eyes to shoot open. “Stay awake, Shiro.”

“Keith!” Lance yells at him, bringing him back to the moment. They need to think fast or they’re completely  _ fucked _ . He swallows down whatever is churning within him, and gestures Lance to come help him with Shiro.

“Hook me up to Lotor. I’m going to go down to limbo to get him,” Keith says. “We need to give Lotor a kick somehow, and it’ll send him back up.”

“There’s a defibrillator here,” Pidge comes over with two cases, the bright yellow first aid box and the familiar silver briefcase. “If we jolt Lotor enough, it might wor? At any rate, it’d probably bring him back to life too. If we do it when Allura’s music comes on, we can simulate our own kick.”

It’s a shaky idea at best, but Keith’s willing to try it. Lance helps him pull Shiro over and Keith lays down in between Shiro and Lotor.

“What about Shiro?” Lance asks, and Keith shakes his head. “Is he still hanging on?”

“He’s almost on his way there,” Keith says, and turns his head to look at Shiro. Shiro’s clearly struggling to keep his eyes open, each blink longer than the rest as his breath rattles through his body. His eyes are glassy, like he’s not fully here. “Put him under with me. If he’s going to go to limbo, I’d rather be by his side.”

“Good luck boss,” Lance says, right before Keith falls under.

  
  


* * *

  
  


They come to on the shore of a beach,and Keith’s not surprised. He gasps and sputters and shakes his head like a wet dog before looking around. Foam and waves crash around him and five feet away, he sees a figure rise up from the water.

Shiro looks surprised to be alive. Looks down at his stomach before scanning the horizon, and waving when he sees Keith.

“I don’t feel any pain,” Shiro calls out to him as he tries to stand up in the sand and gets his bearings. The surprise on his face melts into easy acceptance.

“You won’t,” Keith replies back. Gone is the military snow-camouflage. They’re both in the same suits they are wearing on the flight, and there’s no patch of dark red blood blooming on Shiro’s shirt.

“Where are we?” Shiro asks. Rays of sun run glittering across the water and in the distance, dark storm clouds start to roll in. Shiro finally turns to face the shoreline and lets out a soft “ _ oh _ .”

“Limbo,” Keith responds. “We need to find Lotor.”

“Did I die?” There’s a sense of wonder in Shiro’s voice that deeply unsettles Keith. Keith shakes his head, and tips it in the direction of the shore. 

“No,” Keith says, but Shiro’s got a faraway look as thunder echoes in the long distance. “I brought you down here so that I could watch over you. Just in case you die in the observation deck, you’ll already be beside me here.”

He gets silence as a response, so Keith starts to tread. They make their way towards the beach, Keith trying to gauge how much time they have. A cityscape sprawls over the ridge in front of them. It’s built out of tall and identical apartment buildings, all worn down. Years of neglect and grief have eroded the concrete, leaving a crumbling skeleton of what once was.

“Who built all of this?” Shiro asks, and Keith replies honestly. 

“My parents.”

Shiro frowns, before his eyes widen with realization. If Keith’s parents dreamed this, there would be no reason for them to encounter it. Unless-

“How long were you in limbo with your parents?” Shiro asks gently, having figured it out. Limbo is vast and empty, a raw and infinite abyss unless one of the dreamers has already been there. 

Keith pauses, unsure if he should answer. Shiro is earnest and looks like he’s genuinely curious. And he probably is; his face has an expression of boyish wonder on it, half-distracted by everything he sees. Shiro making the connection has already told him more about Keith than Keith is ready to give over in the moment, so Keith doesn’t give an answer.

Shiro doesn’t press him for one either.

They trudge across the beach, steeped in silence while they look for an answer or even the slightest hint as to where Lotor would be. The city looms in front of them, quiet in the way that it intimidates. Keith can still hear the waves crash behind them, but can’t hear the strain of any music. It’s hard to measure time in limbo— it’s unquantifiable. Infinite. Painful.

The ridge that they climb up the beach is familiar. All of this is familiar; it’s a diorama of a life that Keith had lived with his parents. His past echoes around him with each step he takes, but he tries to keep it repressed. It hurts to see it but in the end, Keith has a mission he needs to focus on.

They climb the dirt and rocks to gain a better vantage point. Keith focuses on the city, looking for any sign of life or disturbance, wondering where Lotor would have gone. The city is a shell of different landmarks from Keith’s parents’ life, and he knows the streets are intricate and whimsical. This was their playground and while Keith had learned it well, he didn’t know where to begin.

There’s a sharp intake of breath beside him, and Keith spins to see what Shiro’s looking at. 

It hadn’t been there before. Keith had done a full 360 of their environment before and hadn’t seen it. Even from the ground, it would have been hard to miss the robin-blue home that now sits on the edge of the seaside cliff. It’s a few hundred feet away, and dark clouds have already started rolling above it. The waves have turned tumultuous at the bottom of the cliff, and Keith knows.

“I think that’s where he is,” Shiro says softly. “That’s your house, isn’t it?”

“My…” Keith trails off, looks at the house. That’s undoubtedly where Lotor will be, safeguarded by both his parents. Who Keith thinks will give Lotor over readily, as long as Keith’s willing to make a sacrifice.

And Keith will have to bring Shiro there. He can’t leave him behind, can’t risk losing Shiro in limbo in case things go sideways. Can’t risk leaving Shiro here to be haunted by whatever has haunted Keith.

For the first time in a long time, Keith feels some genuine fear about the type of vulnerability he’s about to expose.

“Keith?” Shiro calls his name, but Keith’s unresponsive. The clock is ticking up above, but here in limbo, it stretches on eternally. Enough for Keith to start feeling panic rising within him.

He must wear it on his face, because he feels a hand circle his wrist. Or so he thinks.

There’s something unnatural about the fingers that wrap around Keith. The texture of the skin is smooth but feels artificial, more porous than normal. The fingers tighten and the movement feels rigid. Keith turns just enough to look at Shiro.

“I was in the military,” Shiro says quietly, apropos of nothing. 

Keith knows this. He tells Shiro as much. Anyone who’s heard of Takashi Shirogane knows that before he had become a lethal businessman, he had served as a bright young pilot.

“I had an accident,” Shiro continues. Keith’s aware of Shiro stepping closer to him and conceding, he turns to fully face the other man. “System failure on a test flight.”

“I know that too,” Keith replies and Shiro presses his lips together. His eyes fall downcast, like he’s trying hard to think about what comes next. 

Shiro picks up Keith’s hand and turns it, bringing up his left hand to support underneath. He splay the palm of his right hand over Keith’s and Keith can tell the stark difference between the two, now that he’s making physical contact with both. The weight of the hand on top is interesting, significantly heavier.

“The limb itself was nearly shredded. This is a mess of blood, titanium, and luxite,” Shiro says. “And the weight of it is strange. I contemplated using it as a totem. But it’s not like I can let anyone not touch it, as much as I want to.”

Shiro curls his fingers against Keith’s palm and the action makes a soft  _ tktktk _ sound that Keith’s never noticed before.

“I’m not as much of a tourist as I’ve been pretending,” Shiro says with a half-sigh. “My training extends beyond whatever Marmora likes to teach its clients.”

“Yeah?” Keith murmurs and he can’t help himself. He slides and circles his fingers around Shiro’s wrist. Shiro lets him squeeze it gently.

“After my accident they wanted to put me to use in a different way,” Shiro says almost idly. “Started to train me as an extractor. But it turns out trauma from a fiery crash can really kick around your brain in the long term.”

Keith blinks. The implications of it hits him suddenly— he’s been giving Shiro lessons for things he already knows. Whatever’s been happening has been telling Shiro a lot more than Keith thought it had. His fingers start to slip but Shiro grabs him by the wrist again.

“So you lied,” Keith says simply. There’s no accusation in his tone. He doesn’t need it. “You know a lot more than you let on.”

It doesn’t disappoint Keith. Not as much anyways; he always had an inkling that Shiro knee more than he let on, though he thought that had been just another facet of his character. 

“Have you not hidden things from your friends as well?” Shiro asks, raising an eyebrow. “Kolivan told me about you but there’s clearly some things he doesn’t know either.”

“Why-” 

“I trust you Keith,” Shiro says. “I want you to trust me too. I didn’t share it before because I wanted to see what you’re made of, but now there’s no point. I trust your capabilities more than anything.”

“And Keith…” Shiro trails off. “You don’t need to explain yourself to me. Wounds are not meant to be re-opened.”

It’s Keith’s turn to give Shiro a scrutinizing look. They’re about to go somewhere that’s a sore spot for Keith; this is probably Shiro’s way of balancing the playing field. 

And it might be working.

It’s strange that Keith’s known this man for half a year, yet he’s been able to weasel his way into Keith’s life like this. That Keith forgets the imbalance in vulnerability— that Keith remembers that there are different ways to be on equal footing with someone. He wonders if there’s more Shiro has, if there’s more Shiro is willing to give him before they go to Keith’s childhood home. He almost asks. 

“Let’s go,” Keith says instead.

* * *

  
  
In the end, the trajectory of Keith’s life would always lead him here. It’s in his blood that what haunts him also anchors him.

The home is decrepit on the outside. Blue paint peels off and it’s clear the house has seen better days. It thrums with hollow life, whatever pale imitation of vitality Keith’s mind can conjure. Beyond the cliff that the house sits on, the horizon yawns into the ocean. The waters have started to thunder, and lightning crackles over the house. 

His parent’s last gift to him.

Keith knew that past the creaky screen door, within the depths of this home, he would find his parents. It’s no surprise to him when he and Shiro come across them in the dining room, two of them bent over dinner plates in conversation. Behind them, the kitchen bleeds into a backyard deck that overlooks the ocean.

They notice him; they’ve noticed him a long time back. But they still make him wait. Shiro is stiff beside him and Keith wants to call him a grounding presence, but he’s so nervous about making sure that Shiro is safe,that he feels as tumultuous as the waves below them.

“Mom?” Keith says as they approach his parents quietly. “Dad?”

There’s a low rumbling that Keith feels under his feet as he steps in. A sharp pain tugs at Keith but he ignores it in favour of keeping a calm facade.

His parents stop whispering to each other and look up.

“You’ve come back,” his mother says gently.  _ Your version of her _ , he reminds herself because she at least is still alive. His father…

“We missed you,” his father says, and Keith presses his lips together in a tight line. There’s a muffled sound off in the distance, and Keith reaches out to brush his fingers against Shiro’s. Shiro gets the hint and while Keith advances, Shiro moves, follows the sound of Lotor moaning in pain.

Keith’s parents don’t quite look at him.

“Will you stay with us?” his mother asks, and Keith doesn’t reply. He keeps an ear out for Shiro shuffling in the background, looking for Lotor while keeping a wary eye on his parents.

“There’s nothing to stay here for,” Keith replies.

His parents had never been violently angry when his father was alive. They had loved with stern words but they had never had outbursts. This fact grounds him as his father suddenly grabs the plate that had been placed in front of her and throws it at Keith.

Keith ducks and the plate shatters beside him. He closes his eyes and clenches his fists— they are not real.

“You think we do not love you?” His father asks, folding his hands back over the table as he acts like nothing happened. There’s a quiet type of anger radiating from his mother as well. 

“I know you do not love me,” Keith replies. “You aren’t real.”

“Oh Keith,” his other, his projection of his mother trails off. “You still have a chance. You still have a chance to love  _ us _ , Keith.”

“I can’t,” Keith’s voice feels broken, like he’s speaking around barbed wire. “I can’t keep you guys trapped here like this forever. You aren’t real.”

“What does it matter?” his father asks, and there’s a sharp bite to his voice that wasn’t there before. “What does it matter if this is real or not? This is another chance to live the life they could have.”

And Keith… Keith could stay with his parents here in limbo. He could let Shiro and Lotor escape while he spends one lifetime after another with his parents, till the plane touches down in Los Angeles. Keith knows that would be the safest option for everyone.

Keith also knows that it would damage him beyond repair. That he’d be so haunted by it, he’d live the rest of his life in a vacant haze. That reality would start to fade, and he’d find himself in an abyss again.

“There is no difference,” his mother cuts in, voice uncharacteristically harsh. “The real world and this one are the same. The only difference is that you will not have the burden of what you did when you stay with us here.”

Keith closes his eyes and breathes through his nose. He knows this isn’t something he should let affect him like it does. 

“He’s not going to find him,” his mother says. “Not the real him anyways.”

“Where is he?” Keith asks, and his parents give him a pleasant smile. “Where are you keeping him?”

“Outside,” his father replies. “Do you want to see?”

Keith wants to call out to Shiro, but doesn’t want to startle his parents. Cautiously, he watches as they open the glass sliding doors.

They were not lying. Lotor is bound and tied on the ground, looking very much like he’s seen better days. He’s damp with sweat and his eyes are wide in terror and god, Keith hopes he hasn’t damaged the heir to one of the largest energy companies in the world irreparably.

His father pulls Lotor up by hair like he’s nothing; Keith panics and starts to dart towards them. But his parents are quicker— with a grunt, his dad hauls Lotor over the balcony. 

“You—!” Keith yells and runs to the railing. It’s too late, because Lotor’s body falls into the abyss. Before he can watch him land, Keith’s pulled off by the collar by his mother.

“We’ll always do what you want, Keith,” his mother replies coolly. Keith’s eyes go wide as he hears Shiro yelling behind him.

Keith whips around— Shiro must have realized that Lotor is nowhere to be found, must have heard the heavy thunk of the doors opening.

“Keith” Shiro calls out, looking startled at the scene he comes across.

“Stay where you are!” Keith yells back, trying to pry himself out of his mother’s hold. He doesn’t want Shiro to run into any more trouble, doesn’t want Shiro playing a hero. Shiro looks conflicted like he doesn’t want to obey.

The doors burst behind him, and a group of strangers pour into the kitchen and dining room. They’re people who Keith’s seen in passing; their faces are blurred, like they’re moving photographs, people Keith can’t quite recall.

“Shiro, watch out—!” Keith yells but it’s too late. The projections move fast, wrapping their hands around Shiro and starting to pull him back. Shiro struggles and flails, but he’s weak against the projections, strangers whose faces Keith can’t remember.

“Keith!” Shiro yells out, and Keith tries desperately to lunge towards him, but his parents grab him once more.The floor continues to vibrate, rattling Keith to the bones and his mother locks his arms behind him.

“Shiro-” 

“What do you have left in the real world?” His father asks, not sounding like his father at all. His voice is rougher, slightly higher pitched— sounding more like Keith’s.

“I-” Keith stutters as his father advances on him. 

“Whatever happened, you were young, it’s not your fault-” Shiro calls out, and one of the projections slaps a hand over Shiro’s mouth. He manages to shove it out of the way, long enough to spit out a, “Keith, the person you’re trying to blame is just a child!”

“Don’t listen to him,” Keith’s mother says curtly from behind him, still unrelenting in how hard she holds onto him. The ground shakes under him, as if deep underneath there is a deafening roar. 

“I have friends waiting for me,” Keith grunts, tries to pry himself out but she is too strong. “People who are waiting for me in the real world.  _ You’re  _ there in the real world.”

He directs this to his mother, just to get a scoff in return.

“Stay with me here, Keith,” her voice is icy. “This version of me will love you unconditionally. This version of me didn’t have her husband killed because you decided to interfere.” 

The pain burns a bullet hole in Keith’s heart, and he wants to retch. His eyes prick with heat, and he can feel his breathing speed up.

“No,” Keith says to the floor more than anything, going lax in his mother’s arms. “No-”

“They’re lying!” Shiro practically yells— the projections are too strong for him to completely shake off but he’s putting one hell of a fight.

Around them, the world starts to rumble harder. It gives a hard enough shake that a painting falls off the wall, and a glass rattles across the wooden dining table. In the far distance, there is a thunderous loud  _ BOOM _ .

Krolia lets go of Keith in surprise -- Keith in turn tries to make a run for it, but his father grabs him by his hair, practically tearing it as he yanks him back. Keith’s crippled by his mother’s words and his reflexes are too slow, so he finds himself getting hauled back as he tries to reach Shiro.

“This isn’t you,” a sob threatens to wrack Keith’s body but he tries to tamp it down, tries to speak as this time, tears form for good. They start to drip down his face as he tries to put up a strong fight. “These memories aren’t you. You and mom were never like this. You- you’re just my guilt.”

“We are,” his mother says sweetly, just as his father kicks out Keith’s ankles and sends him to his knees. “This guilt is all you have left of us. And if you can’t find us in the real world and you can’t find us here, then where will you find us?”

“Don’t listen to them!” Shiro cries out desperately, and Keith wants to convey that he’s trying. That it’s killing him to have this delivered unto him by his own mother— that he’s on the verge of forgetting this is, at the end of the day, a projection of his own self conscious.

“I will live with the guilt,” Keith replies. He “But I need to  _ live _ and-”

Keith doesn’t get to finish his sentence. There’s a deafening burst of sound, like the Earth is splitting in two, and suddenly the edge of the cliff the house sits on starts to cleave in two. A large crack runs through the floor, breaking apart as the house crumbles with the rocks.

It happens so fast that Keith can’t even run in time. One moment he sees Shiro’s face and in another, the ground is yanked out from underneath him and his parents and gravity starts to suck him into the void. Reflexively, he grabs his parents as well, yanking them down even as they struggle to get off the crumbling deck.

They yell, scream, screech,  _ what have you done?, Keith what have you done? Not again, Keith, Keith-- _

but Keith needs to drag them down, needs to get rid of them once and for all— 

_ I can’t _ , Keith thinks in panic and flails, but there’s nothing he can do.  _ I can’t lose Shiro— _

But he knows he will. Knows as the floor gives out, he’s going to have to find Shiro if Shiro doesn’t follow him down. Knows that Shiro won’t.

He thinks he screams Shiro’s name but has no time to think because-

  
  


* * *

When Lance had been collecting information of Lotor, he had gotten a glimpse of the one photo Lotor’s father had kept of the two of them, nestled in between photos of his late wife. It had been Lotor as a child, held by his father as he blew on a small purple pinwheel. Lance had told them that in a fit of lucid rage, Lotor’s father had swiped the photo off of his bedside table. Lotor had picked it up and placed it back, only to hear another assistant get told to take it away.

When Keith wakes up in the observation deck, gasping like he’s been slapped, he sees Lotor standing with that pinwheel. Lotor stares at the slowly spinning blades, mouth partially open, eyes glistening as ceiling dust falls around him. Behind him, a large vaulted safe stands open, leading to a room where his father’s hospital bed is set up. A red  _ 117-987  _ flickers on the door of the safe.

A loud explosion goes off to the right, and Keith hears Lance yell, “Where’s Shiro?”

He’s still not awake.

“Send me back down,” Keith says frantically, rising up. Pidge pushes him back down with a flat palm to his chest and gives him a concerned look.

“Are you sure?” Pidge says. “The kick’s coming soon-”

“It’ll be decades for him,” Keith shakes his head, tries to reach for the silver briefcase himself. Pidge swats his hand away. “I can’t leave him there.”

Pidge looks like she wants to tell him to leave it, but presses her lips together in a thin line. She nods, and turns to press the switch in the briefcase to send Keith under again.

Before Keith fades, he realizes that he’s facing down the possibility of spending a lifetime of looking for Shiro on the flip of a dime. But he doesn’t have time to dwell on it.

* * *

  
Time is different in limbo. It’s unpredictable and stretches while simultaneously compacting itself. An eternity stretches out into a minute the size of a marble.

So it goes. 

It feels like Keith searches for Shiro for  _ years _ . He treads the expanse, loses track of time. Weaves through the crumbling graveyard of his parent’s creations. They are gone— long gone. It’s a testament to how effectively Keith killed them off as they had been sent over the cliff that only whispers of them haunt him as he looks for Shiro. It’s not quantifiable, it’s beyond any type of comprehension. But Keith keeps going on, keeps wandering an endless abyss to look for Shiro.

And as soon as Keith finds himself washing up on a beach, feels the wet sand under his hands and the pain that rattles through both his head and his heart, the penance that came with his endless search immediately washes away. Years compress into seconds and when Keith stares up at an old face with familiar, sharp eyes, he feels like he’s only searched for a moment.

“Have you come to kill me?” Shiro asks, half-obscured by the sun. Relief rolls in with the water him.

Though, he can’t tell if Shiro recognizes him.

Wordlessly, Shiro leads Keith through the beach, up the side of a low ridge. A stately bungalow sits on the other side, as broad and imposing as the man with Keith. This is not the beach of Keith’s dreams— he has found it far away, worlds apart. But it bears striking similarities to the beach they’ve visited together. 

The inside of the bungalow is as grand as the exterior. Keith is placed at the end of a very long, dark mahogany table. Faintly, something in Keith tells him that the rich red tapestries and golden lanterns suspended mid-air look very much like the ballroom where Shiro and Keith first met. The lanterns cast a rich, fiery golden glow around them and under the flickering light, Keith can see the shades of a young man in Shiro.

Shiro takes a seat on the other end of the table, and it’s then that Keith notices that he has security detail. They stand behind him in the shadows, black suits with their arms crossed over their front.

“You look like a man I knew,” Shiro says. His voice has gone hoarse with age. “Once upon a time.”

“From a long forgotten dream,” Keith replies gently, and Shiro visibly pauses. He stares at Keith again and his fist curls on top of the table.

“I would not forget who you are, Keith,” Shiro replies. There’s a wistfulness to his voice that Keith can’t quite place and it tugs low at Keith’s gut. “Though I do not know...if the version of you that sits before me right now is real…”

The statement takes Keith by surprise. Shiro’s old and Keith wonders what kind of life he’s been living down here. Shiro’s had training before, but Keith’s still unsure of the extent of it. Even the strongest extractor can get trapped in limbo— it’s not a familiar world for most. Even what they’ve done in this mission isn’t familiar to most. 

“I’ve come to take you back,” Keith says. “Shiro, we need you. Come back with me.”

An eternity ago, Keith had felt desperation as the world crumbled underneath him and took him and his parents with it. He had come to terms with that desperation, had let it wash out and fade in the time that he spent looking for Shiro. Had done his penance. 

Keith feels the beginnings of that same desperation bubble within him as Shiro looks at him tentatively, slightly distrustful. A full minute passes by in silence before Shiro says—

“There’s something I want you to see first.”

* * *

  
Keith isn’t jolted awake as much as he’s gently pulled into the realm of consciousness. By the time his sleep-blurred eyes manage to focus on the  _ no smoking  _ sign above him, the rest of his senses have slowly snapped into place. His whole body buzzes, and he inhales softly through his nose. 

There is rustling around him and Keith chances a glance around him. Allura is giving him a small smile, while Lance is staring up at the ceiling with an incredulous look. Keith can’t see Hunk and Pidge, doesn’t dare look ahead to Lotor, but by the way that Allura’s eyes flicker between him and the seat in front of him and her smile stays solid, Keith feels a modicum of relief. 

His eyes drift and inevitably they land on Shiro. Shiro, who had turned onto his side in his sleep. Shiro who is awake now, staring at Keith wordlessly. Keith tries not too swallow too visibly but Shiro catches the action and his gaze drags slow between them. His dark brown eyes seem deeper, more timeless now as he looks at Keith. It’s an arresting look. 

Keith thinks about what Shiro said. What Shiro’s done. The vestiges of what Shiro had told them when they were alone in limbo have wrapped around Keith and threaten to never let go. There is a truth in there, a truth that’s latched onto the two of them, a truth he doesn’t know that he can escape. 

There’s so much Keith is immediately inclined to do. Lunging across the aisle and taking Shiro’s face into his hands would be a dead giveaway so instead, Keith just looks at him.

Romelle steps into his view and hands him both a hot towel and an immigration form, telling him they have twenty minutes till landing. By the time she moves on, Shiro’s already sitting up with the airplane phone in hand, speaking in a hushed whisper.

Keith yearns so bad. Yearns to reach out to Shiro. To touch him, to feel the weight of his palm in the real world. But they have to keep their distance. They can’t know each other, can’t do anything but give a neutral polite smile as the plane touches down and the seatbelt sign comes off.

Lance and Lotor step out into the aisle to disboard after Shiro does, Lotor with a dazed look on his face. Recognition does not flash across his face when he catches Keith’s eye, and Keith breathes a sigh of relief. 

The back of Shiro’s broad suit disappears through the line for customs before Keith can catch up to him. He momentarily forgets about it as he approaches the counter, tense as he hands over his passport. 

Keith feels rigid as the customs officer scrunches their eyes and stares at his passport. They look back up at him, before typing furiously into their computer. Keith looks around, sees Allura clear customs and give him a small salute over her shoulder. Pidge and Hunk are already on the other side, while Lotor is still waiting in line. Shiro is nowhere to be seen but he, out of all of them, would have the least amount of trouble getting through.

“Welcome back to America,” the officer says, and Keith tries not to look too visibly relieved. He takes his papers with a nod and for the first time in years, steps onto American soil. 

No one is waiting for him in the reception area. Keith tries to shake his thoughts but he can’t. He knows Shiro is going to haunt his thoughts, thinks he might have to reach out to him. Keith doesn’t know what he’ll say though. Doesn’t know if Shiro would want any of it. 

Keith will push it to the back of his mind right now. For all the emotional turmoil, there’s a chance that whatever had passed between them in the dream will remain just that— a dream.

In the meanwhile, there’s someone that Keith needs to visit first.  
  


* * *

  
Keith can’t fix everything back to the way it was before he had to flee. The chassis for his old life had long incinerated into nothingness. But he’s no longer haunted by the memory of his parents, only traces of what he had. He no longer wonders what could have been— he moves forward.

It helps that he can see his mother again. Krolia doesn’t hide from him like he thought she would. Within two days of returning to America, Keith’s mother corners him in the aisle of a CVS. He drops his basket, thinking he’s dreaming again. The strong arms around him and the soft way she sobs into his hair tells him he’s not. 

His mother has gotten back some of that old flame that she had within her. She doesn’t move back to the ranch, but she puts her number in Keith’s phone. It calms him when she calls him and it calms him even more to know that she’s settled in a tiny studio apartment in a big city fifty miles away.

They talk openly, sometimes. It’ll take a lot more time for them to rebuild their relationship but for now, Keith tells her fractional amounts of what he’s been up to. His mother tells him too, tells him how she’s been running in fringe extractor circles, tells him she’s heard about him and that it hurt to not be able to contact him. Tells him Kolivan had found her and told her what had gone wrong in the Marmora job. He doesn’t need to tell her what it did to Hira, spending a lifetime in a void with crumbling buildings, not knowing where she was. 

And for some reason, his mother apologizes to Keith. He tells her there’s no need but she’s insistent. His mother tells him that even if he had been a kid who had gotten caught up where he shouldn’t have, that he was a kid nonetheless and it was their fault for putting him in that position. She’s made peace with what’s happened, she says, and she hopes in time that he will too. Keith knows this means that she visits his father in her dreams but that seems to be what happens to those in their line of work. 

Keith still feels fragmented when it comes to his past, but he locks those pieces up in a box and stores it away. He doesn’t dream. He does take the house.

The ranch house needs a lot of work, but it occupies Keith. He repairs the wooden porch and replaces the screen door. The inside of the house is repainted in muted warm colours, in stark contrast to the bright bursts his parents had liked when they all lived there. Keith goes into the city for supplies and watches over his shoulder for anyone that might be following him.

One day he sees a news header one morning, one that says that Altea Corporation’s acquisition by a familiar company has been finally made public. It sits over a short video of Shiro shaking hands with another executive. A week after, there is another announcement that GALRA Engineering has officially dissolved. Keith stops looking over his shoulder.

And he waits.

It might be a fruitless wait but in the dead of the night, when he can hear the low whistle of the wind and a bird tapping its beak against his window, when the sounds of the ranch around him rattle around in a comfortable way that he has missed deeply, Keith dreams again.

The dream ebbs and flows like a lazy breeze, but it is always the same. He dreams of Shiro.

Shiro had known and not known he was in limbo. Keith had told him when they first landed on the beach, but Shiro did not know how to wake himself up. Shiro had thought for a moment that he too would be able to fall— but the building had crumbled around him and he too dropped along with the falling cliff. It must not have been severe enough because Shiro hadn’t woken up, had just bruised and battered himself. The crowd of projections that had been trying to hold him back had vanished as soon as Keith had woken up. 

Shiro teetered between trying again but when he had peered over the rubble that had been left behind, he had seen the sleeve of Keith’s jacket stick out, along with a bloodied hand. Keith’s parents didn’t have the pleasure of waking up from a dream, but at least they had stopped haunting limbo.

Keith’s remains were one more cruel trick of the mind but Shiro had somehow still held out hope that Keith would be looking for him. 

So much time had passed that Shiro forgot whether he actually was in limbo. He didn’t forget that someone was looking for him. Didn’t forget Keith. However, he had forgotten that the two were the same. And so Shiro wandered off and built himself his own world, complete with his own projections.

The first had been of his parents. Shiro hadn’t been very good at making them— they had passed away at a very young age, and he had been taken in by a courteous relative who kept him at a distance for his entire childhood. He had constructed the apartment building they had lived in again, the worn down place where he spent most of his time as a kid. But Shiro had spent too much time running away from his upbringing in the real world, so he let it crumble in his dream. He had shown Keith the ashes of the building, shown Keith a faded photo of Shiro and his parents, both of whom had their faces blurred.

Shiro had also tried other people he knew. Friends. Co-workers. Employees. He made shells of the few he had held close in his life, and it pained him when he couldn’t capture their likeness fully. He ended up relegating them to being his bodyguards, though he had nothing real to protect himself against but time.

And Shiro had tried Keith.

Keith was the last person Shiro had seen, so Shiro was able to create a strong projection. Shiro had admitted with no shame that he wanted Keith’s companionship, so he made him as close to the Keith that he remembered as he could. He built that Keith a ranch house to stay in, one that was an earnest imitation of the one that Keith’s parents had.

But that Keith had been missing something crucial. That Keith would not interact with Shiro. For a brief, passing moment, that projection had asked Shiro to come back to the real world with him, but nothing had come of it. The projection started to treat Shiro more like a ghost than anything. Because it was a projection, Shiro thought he could change it but that projection came from an unmalleable place in Shiro that he himself could not access. 

So Shiro had made a compromise.

“I built a ghost of you,” Shiro had said as they stood on the ridge they had climbed up. “And it did not work.”

On one side was the beach, and on the other side, the land dipped into a vast field. In the distance, there was the shadow of a ranch house with a lone sycamour planted beside it. The sight of it tugged at Keith’s heart, and he had felt like he couldn’t breathe.

“So I built a ghost of myself,” Shiro says, staring out at the house in the distance. The sun still glares above them— Keith wonders if Shiro has ever made it set. “And you liked him. I watched us build a life together in that home. But sometimes I would forget that was supposed to be us. That I had made them like us. So I watched. And I...wanted.”

Under the thundering of his own heart, Keith had wondered how Shiro had grown to be so open. It was a brief thought though, because Keith was thereafter overwhelmed by the idea that Shiro had entertained the idea of spending a lifetime with  _ him _ . That Keith— that Keith had left enough of a mark on Shiro for that.

That retrospectively, Shiro had left enough of a mark on Keith for Keith to hunt him down for an eternity in limbo. For Keith to look harder than he had for Hira, for Keith to know that he was looking because of reasons beyond Shiro being his client. 

Keith could have given up. He’s made an immaculate disappearance before, and he could do it again. He knows that if they had gotten what they wanted and it had been Lotor that had been left in limbo, he would not have followed him in.

The realization of it had made Keith’s throat close up. He felt everything all at once, and had turned to the man standing beside him. Even under the steady gaze of the sun, Shiro’s face kept flickering between young and old, like a video reel straining between pictures.

“In the end, I don’t think you responded to me because you were just a shade,” Shiro had said to himself more than anything. “Someone like you can’t be captured in a dream. Even now I wonder…”

“Come back with me,” Keith had said, and had reached out for Shiro’s hand. It felt human in his. “Come back to the real world with me, Shiro.”

Shiro had given a small smile at that, lost in thought.

“If I’ve made you as well,” Shiro had said quietly.“This version I have made of you is the best version.”

“I’m real,” Keith had murmured. “Come back with me. Let’s be young men together again.”

_ Grow old with me the proper way. Feel all of this for me with your real life. _

That had been left unspoken. 

“You had wanted to choose me over your parents,” Shiro had said, and Keith felt him squeeze his hands. “Or was that my dream? They were—”

“Memories,” Keith replied firmly. “My mother is still alive. That memory had been a disservice.”

Shiro looked away at that, and for a moment he did not look old. He looked young, younger even than Keith had known him.

“You are real, Shiro,” Keith had twined his fingers in between Shiro’s. He turned them both to face each other, to look at Shiro’s ever changing expression, his ever-changing age. Eventually, he settled into the Shiro that Keith had known. That Keith knows. “We can build this again. Do not die alone in this world—”

“—Thinking of what could have been,” Shiro finishes off, looking down at Keith. He draws closer, house in the distance forgotten. “Do you really intend to wake me up?”

“Yes,” Keith had breathed, and Shiro had exhaled through his nose.

“How?” Shiro had asked, and Keith felt the gun he had tucked into the holster under his jacket weigh against him. It promised him a chance to rebuild and a chance to piece himself together into the man he wished to be. It promised Keith a passage back home, one where he would be able to see his mother again. It promised him a new lifetime to be built up with the man who stood in front of him. If Shiro wanted it when they woke up.

“Take a leap of faith with me,” Keith had said. 

And Shiro did.

* * *

Keith revisits that dream often. But he doesn’t call Shiro. 

Not yet, anyways.

Shiro needs time, needs space, needs all the therapy that his trench-deep pockets can provide. Keith doesn’t know if he’s clinging on to hope, but he’s come out of a second jaunt from limbo. Having lived two full lifetimes now, he feels serene. A blanket of calm settles over his life, and he waits.

* * *

It takes three months.

By then, Keith’s settled in to his new life. It’s solitary but it’s pleasant; an intermission before the unknown visits him again. And in that intermission, Shiro comes to him.

It’s on a cool autumn night, with the moon hanging low and red in the sky. Keith’s sitting on his couch, dozing off to reruns of an old science fiction movie. His phone lies beside him, battery dead for the past few hours. Keith’s just about to slip into a dark, dreamless sleep, when there’s a sharp rap against his door.

Keith blinks, still trapped in the haziness of almost-sleep. The knock repeats itself, and he’s fully awake now. The digital clock that sits in the television cabinet reads 10 P.M, too late for a visitor. Keith feels a sense of wariness at the hour. 

He switches the channel to the one hooked up to the discreet surveillance camera he’s set up against one of the wooden beams on the porch. And drops his remote. 

The knock comes a third time, and Keith closes his eyes. He inhales deeply, counting back from ten as he rises from his couch. Despite all his calm, his heart is beating rapidly in his chest. Keith swallows around the lump that starts to grow in his throat, and crosses his living room to open the door. 

“Hey,” Keith says as he opens the door just enough to show his face. The porch light is a dying yellow bulb that Keith’s long been meaning to switch out, but it does his visitor justice. Keith attempts to look amiable enough on the outside, hiding the fact that he’s suddenly realized he might not be as prepared as he thought. 

He’s daydreamed about this moment many times. Whether it would happen here, or in a cafe in Paris in five years, or in a bodega in New York in ten. He’s daydreamed about the first words they’d say to each other, but he’s never quite been able to pin what would make him the happiest. It doesn’t matter, anyways. 

“I’m sorry,” Shiro spills out immediately in lieu of a greeting. Keith startles, the apology unexpected, and lets go of the door. It doesn’t creak anymore as it drifts fully open. 

“For what?” Keith blinks, and Shiro shoves his hands in the pockets of his immaculate dark suit. He looks uncertain, looks at the ground instead of Keith. 

Over his shoulder, Keith sees a black sedan pulled up beside his own beat up red truck. There’s enough light spilling out for Keith to see that Shiro came alone, that there’s no guard waiting and drumming their fingers on the steering wheel. 

“You...I…” Shiro trails off, and he finally looks up at Keith. He shifts, seems to step forward but abort halfway. “I don’t know. I don’t know. For taking so long.”

Shiro is clearly more vulnerable than Keith’s seen him. In the lucid world at least. Keith wonders how well Shiro has actually been able to cope with coming back. He hasn’t heard anything through the grapevine, and had debated getting in touch with Shiro to check. And Keith would have too, if a long enough time had passed without him hearing from Shiro. 

“You needed the time,” Keith replies simply. “How are you feeling?”

“Almost everything’s back to normal,” Shiro says. “Almost.”

Keith knew what he had actually wanted to do was to call Shiro immediately after finding his mother. To call Shiro after each step he took forward in rebuilding himself. But Shiro had his own experience to deal with and in the end, nerves disguised as respect had won out. 

“Want to sit inside or outside?” Keith asks, stepping back to make space for Shiro. There’s a creaky swing-bench in the porch they can sit and stargaze from. He lets the silence linger for a good fifteen seconds before continuing. “...or right here?” 

“I’m sorry,” Shiro says again, and Keith shakes his head. 

“Stop apologizing,” he says, firmer this time. Shiro bites his lip, chews it a little like he’s thinking and Keith thinks this conversation would be better if they had a dining table between them and a drink in each of their hands. 

“I can’t stop thinking about—” Shiro cuts himself off, but doesn’t avert his eyes. Keith curls his fist at his side, reminds himself to choose his words carefully. Tries to remember if he’s ever played this scene out in a daydream. 

“I can’t either,” Keith says softly. “That’s not something that easily leaves a person.”

Shiro’s gaze shifts then from unsure to meaningful, and it looks like he found the stride he was looking for. Keith sees some of that sharp charisma reveal itself again. Shiro looks incredibly handsome, standing on Keith’s porch, bathed in dim golden light like a god. Keith swallows. He doesn’t know if Shiro is just that powerful, or if Keith has gotten just that good at reading the minutiae of his face. 

Keith doesn’t move out of the way when Shiro steps into his space. He wants Shiro’s presence to sink into him and when Shiro raises his arms, Keith follows and falls into an encompassing embrace. 

He can feel Shiro's breath fan over his shoulder before Shiro buries his face in the crook of Keith’s neck. Shiro bunches Keith’s thin black shirt under his hand and wraps himself around Keith tightly. Keith staggers with the force of it and clings on, letting them step over the threshold of his home. 

“I’ve missed you,” Shiro murmurs into Keith’s hair, close enough for Keith to hear. “So much. And I can’t explain it.”

“Shiro,” Keith’s never been a man of many words but he wants to tell Shiro that he’s missed him too. That he became a bright light in Keith’s life as they got to know each other, and that Keith doesn’t think there’s anyone out there that’s quite like Shiro. That there’s a seed of something that had been planted within them in the prism of their dreams. 

Keith stays silent, but holds on harder. They stand like that for a minute, and Keith commits to memory the feeling of having a very real Shiro in his arms. 

“I don’t dream about my time in limbo,” Shiro says into the quiet of the night. “But the feeling remains.”

Keith’s heart seizes up. 

“I do,” he tells Shiro without thinking. “I dream.”

Shiro pulls away at this, but keeps his arms hooked around Keith’s back. 

“About what?”

Keith feels a large hand span between his shoulder blades, rubbing slow circles in to his muscle with its thumb. It’s grounding, but Keith doesn’t mind the feeling of floating. It’s pleasant. 

“You showing me our shadows,” Keith says quietly. “The life that they built together.”

And with the way that he has been moving forward, Keith wholeheartedly feels like he has something to offer now aside from a broken man who’s not always present. There’s a pang of hope in him that’s been resonating since he stepped foot in his home state for the first time in years, and it’s been louder than the sense of defeat that had become so familiar to him. 

“It makes me miss you too, Shiro,” Keith says honestly, and Shiro’s eyes grow brighter. “Makes me want to try it out for real.”

“Yeah?” Shiro whispers, and for once he does not look every inch the powerful man. He does not look like he’s calculating each move, does not look like he’s searching for a weak spot. He looks at Keith like a revelation, and it’s so overwhelming that Keith has to close his eyes. 

“I don’t want to die old and alone, thinking what we could have been,” Keith says, and keeps his eyes closed as he feels Shiro freeze around him. 

Hears his name getting whispered as he feels the static energy of Shiro drawing closer. Hears a soft sigh before feeling the firm press of Shiro’s lips against his. 

Keith’s senses snap into sharp relief with the kiss. The air is crisp and cold around them, making Shiro feel like a solid, heated presence. He can feel the touch reverberate through him, a sine wave that reaches through him and into the earth. Shiro tilts his head to move his lips and Keith feels the time between them. 

This is another way Keith will rebuild himself. He will grip onto Shiro’s shoulders before twining his fingers through his hair, will be an electrical surge against him as many times as Shiro will allow him to. Will build something in this world with him, just like Shiro had built something for them in another.

“Be young with me,” Shiro echoes against Keith’s mouth. It’s earnest and pleading and everything Keith needed.

There’s a truth that’s grown between them, a truth that Keith can’t ignore. A truth that he won’t. 

It feels like a dream.

**Author's Note:**

> wow, another one in the books...
> 
> thank you for indulging and reading this! I appreciate it beyond words. The more I wrote this fic the more I realized the movie had some plot holes so I tried my best ;-;
> 
> come catch me on [ twitter](https://twitter.com/tagteamme) or [tumblr](https://phaltu.tumblr.com/) and talk to me about who the true underrated couple in inception was


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